The Celestial Circle: The Blackened Moons
by Quel33
Summary: The Celestial Circle is where every world in our media coexists brilliantly. Follow one man destined to affect everything and everyone in his life. The chronicles of a crew of misfits destined for greatness: this is my Celestial Circle story. From Naruto to Star Wars: everything collides in this story.
1. Prelude and Synopsis

_**The Celestial Circle**_

_**Book One: The Blackened Moons**_

by Quel33

* * *

**This is a work of fanfiction, there is no relation to any real events, places, organizations, etc.**

* * *

_**Author's Note**_

_I dedicate this work of fanfiction to all of those who have supported me in my life beyond all hopes and expectations, all of whom I plan on repaying with interest._

___It should be noted that a.c. means After Circle, so 1391 years have passed since the cataclysm and the rebuilding of civilization across the Circle and beyond._

* * *

_**Synopsis**_

_The Celestial Circle is an accident. __It is more a creation of misfortune than of providence. F__rom the fires of a war only vaguely remembered in obscure legends the Circle was born; a war fought by the two most powerful species in the known universe: the Humans of 1__st_ _Earth and the Godlike Precursors. The war supposedly lasted for over a century and ended abruptly. A weapon was set off, ripping the very fabric of the universe apart and forming what we now call the Celestial Circle and its surroundings. Over a thousand years have passed since then and we have lost much, but we have also gained much in return. Worlds, realms and universes that had never encountered each other have had a chance to cross-pollinate and the resulting amalgamation of cultures, ideas and beliefs has made for an entirely new and wondrous universe. A universe that is not entirely as it could be, a universe that is in the hold of an impenetrable darkness no one seems to understand. This darkness is the shell that both protects and smothers the Circle. It is the Sea of Chaos that surrounds all of the Circle, with the mysterious "Tethers" being the only way to travel between them. The Cataclysm destroyed all civilization, but it did not eradicate it. The populations of numerous planets have recovered in the past millennia and have branched out, communicating and learning from one another. Five known galaxies survived the Cataclysm and have begun trying to establish footholds within the Circle. A new age of change and strife is about to begin. This is the Celestial Circle, a universe in the throes of strife and change. It is a world you are about to dive into in the following pages. It is a story long in the telling, fragmented and almost forgotten in the mists of time. It is a story of life._

**Welcome to the Celestial Circle**

* * *

_**Part One: The Thief**_

**_Sometimes as I sit and stare at the stars I think back on my life and I remember all of the wrongs I've committed to do things of good intent. You could say I've lived on borrowed time since I was ten years old, when I was adopted by a tribe of beings beyond the comprehension of mortals._**

**_You could say I was the luckiest boy alive to be accepted by such an extraordinary race. You could say my long life of suffering and joy, of laughter and sorrow has been well worth it. You could say all of these things._**

**_But, you're not me and you have no idea of the life I've led, or the prices I have paid throughout it._**

**_Let me enlighten you..._**

* * *

_Beyond the end of the icebound shell_

_To the halls of our ancestors long silent_

_To the graves of the fallen long unkempt_

_We will at last return to our homeland_

_The aspects of the Harbingers will gather once more_

_The regalia will light the path and bar the way_

_The unsung will finally be recalled_

_Under the light of the blood filled moon_

_Our dying Will shall reach its conclusion_

_The Chosen will cross the Threshold_

_And the worlds of men will be born anew_

* * *

_**Prelude: Blackened Bones  
**_

**Planet Vetus, the City of Länis Tuuli, 456 a.c.( After Circle )**

When the Celestial Circle was created chaos ruled. Countless dimensions and worlds that had been separated were now joined forever. In this time of trials there existed a hidden force, a group of beings known collectively as The Tribes. To this day no one knows anything of them; they left behind little evidence of their existence. These Tribes protected the people from the most powerful evils that had unfortunately followed them all to the Circle. Among the Tribes there was one who stood out among all of their kin, this was the Kestävä tribe, the embodiment of courage. Their entire tribe had the appearance of wolfish humans with radiant white hair and unsurpassed beauty. This enigmatic tribe was the most technologically advanced military force in the entire Circle, with their very own fleet of warships and strategic outposts all throughout the Circle. It was thanks to this fearsome tribe that many evils capable of vast devastation were kept at bay and suppressed. The Kestävä had kept the peace for over four and a half centuries, since the inception of the Circle during the Cataclysm.

Our story begins on planet Kotimaa, the home world of the Kestävä tribe, one of the many they dwelled on in the Vetus System. Our protagonist is Quel Tiin, a man orphaned at a young age and taken in by the Kestävä and raised to be one of them. He has grown into a burgeoning warrior within their ranks and serves on the august body of the Fellowship of Kest, the elite guard of the Kestävä Royal Family. Today is the system-wide festival in honor of the Council of Kest's four hundredth and seventh convocation. The Council is the main ruling body of the tribe in affairs of state and is composed of the wisest elders from all corners of the tribe. The current council is said to be made up of sages with unparalleled wisdom and foresight. It is because of them that the entire Circle has been experiencing an extended time of peace and prosperity.

High up on Mt. Arvoa, near the summit, the Council meets in the Hall of the Ancestors. In the royal capital of Kantäisa Syvä the Lantern Ceremony is about to commence. This ceremony is as old as the tribe itself and honors those who died in the tribe's long journey from wherever it was they had come from to the Circle. None remembered their people's origins, only that the journey had been hard and full of peril. While the majority of the royal family was attending the Lantern Ceremony, a few of the children of the king and queen were playing hooky. One such child was the third daughter of the royal couple. She had instead opted to have a private visit with the ancient sage Overrim, the Eyeless.

This is the setting we dive into, right before everything goes to hell...

* * *

"I have so missed your stories Overrim." Princess Selvittää, seventh in line to the throne and Third Daughter of the King and Queen of Kest said. The Princess was known for her sharp mind and love of knowledge. Her birthday gifts from her parents had usually been rare and expensive books. Once possessed of an intellect unrivaled by all, save for one other, Overrim was in failing health and would likely not live through the coming winter.

"I have not seen you or your siblings in many years Your Highness. My stories are perhaps too dull for a woman grown." Overrim looked older than some planets and had so many wrinkles his face resembled the map of a continent. He was a tarutaru from Vana'diel, dressed in flowing robes and seemed particularly small for his already tiny race.

"Nonsense!" she replied. "I will always treasure your stories for the rest of my days. Please share one with me. Please, please, pleaaaasssee!" Selvittää was a rarity among her kin, with hair the color of wheat in full bloom. It was considered sacred to have yellow hair and Selvittää, being of royal blood, was doubly honored for having it. Her eyes were the color of the cerulean skies in autumn and her skin the color of the purest ivory. She had great beauty and did not realize it yet, being too young and innocent to see the way she was looked at by men and women both.

"Very well..." Overrim said in resignation, coughing into a handkerchief. "Do you have any requests?"

They sat around a small table in a cozy study in a remote part of the palace. Bookshelves lined two of the walls, another wall having the large double doors that was the only entrance to the room and the final wall being a giant floor to ceiling stained glass window depicting seagulls in flight over a stormy sea. Off to the side, almost in the shadows of the room's far corner, but not quite, was a group of four people. Three men and one woman, all silently meditating and aware of their surroundings. They paid little attention to their mistresses' conversation with the elder one, but instead focused on everything outside of that. Nothing got past their notice, their vigilance was supreme. These were members of the Fellowship of Kest, the oldest band of siblings in arms that had protected the royal family of the Kestävä since time immemorial. A group of Jedi Knights of equal number to a band of Fellows would be hard pressed to come out the better in a fight. Quel was the youngest member of this foursome and deferred to the others in all things. He had much to learn and to prove.

When the double doors had a knock resound through their thickness the four were not the least bit surprised. They had heard footfalls approaching long before this new arrival had announced themselves. One of the other two men rose and opened the door. Selvittää and Overrim paused in their conversation, curious about who was disturbing them at this time. The Lantern Ceremony should just be commencing, with most of the planet's population packing the large thoroughfares of the capital in eager anticipation of the event.

It was Valkon, one of the commanders of the Fellowship. His long bristly white hair was always perpetually tied in a long flowing pony-tail and his stern countenance was famously permanent. The newer recruits into the Fellowship often joked about why he was so somber, with wild speculation ranging from his wife's possible infidelity, to his bowels being in constant agony. No one answer was accepted.

"Excuse my intrusion Your Highness, Wise One." Valkon said to Selvittää and Overrim in turn. "But I have been sent by His Royal Majesty to escort you to the ceremony." His stern expression wavered for a moment and a smile peeked forth. "My apologies."

Selvittää sighed dramatically. "Don't bother Valkon, I'm sure my father has his reasons. Perhaps we can continue later tonight Overrim?"

"Of course Your Highness, as long as I haven't died of old age by then or fallen asleep."

"Hopefully the later of the two." She smiled and gave the old man a curtsy before heading towards the door.

The attack came without warning and was flawlessly executed. Not one single person in the room saw it take place, but one moment the Princess was walking, all five of her guards gathering to escort her. The next moment, Overrim and all of the Fellowship members had fallen over, mortally wounded. Only Valkon was unharmed, but his soul was irredeemable. Selvittää's eyes grew wide in fear.

"Valkon!? What are you doing?!"

"Only what's necessary Your Highness," he replied too calmly. He grabbed her roughly by the arm and swept her from the room. Her protectors and old tutor's bodies were still warm, and ghostly images of their hearts were rising up from their bodies, forever separated. Out in the corridor, Valkon paused just long enough to make sure everything was quiet before forcefully dragging the Princess alongside him. She was too frightened to cry out, but quickly realized her mistake.

"GUARDS!" she screamed.

A knife, seemingly out of thin air, appeared next to her throat. Valkon's threat was clear, he didn't need to tell her to shut up after that. The palace was too still, something was wrong. Before she could figure out just what was nagging at the back of her mind they came through a four-way intersection and she found out the cause of the unnatural silence: the bodies of servants, regular palace guards and even a few Fellows lay in slowly growing puddles of their own lifeblood. Everyone was far too still, the holes in their bodies ghastly, disgusting. She silently began to cry.

That was when a gust of wind raged down the corridor from the direction they had come. It knocked them to their knees and would have done more if Valkon hadn't been strong enough to hold them both up. Faster than the eye could follow, Quel Tiin appeared before them with the instantaneous speed of a flash step, or shunpo.

Laughing once, Valkon stood back up to his full height, dragging Selvittää with him. "I should have realized you wouldn't die so easily boy. You are partway dead to begin with."

"Having Soul Reaper powers doesn't make me part dead. But if I betrayed my brothers and sisters in arms and the royal family, then I'd be part dead." Quel was coldly collected, a sheen of sweat the only indicator he wasn't as calm as he seemed. "And not long for this world." He growled out between clenched teeth.

Valkon, being a commander of the Fellowship of Kest was ordained to carry a multitude of advanced weaponry. Facing Quel, who had already drawn his soul cutter sword, his zanpakuto, Valkon didn't hesitate. Drawing forth his Pyhä Liekki, his Sword of the Sacred Flame, a weapon given to all Fellows, Valkon pointed it at Quel. His blade was composed of a thousand separate shards of firecell stones and eltalite ore, two of the hardest ores in the known multiverse found only on the world of Minegarde. The blades numerous shards of metal were conjoined by a secret technique the Kestävä tribe's smiths had invented long ago that created a volatile energy matrix. This energy matrix could form a variety of shapes that responded to the user's will. Valkon wanted his to become a giant spinning saw and so the blade did. It buzzed, flying through the air straight for Quel. Raising his sword to block, Quel was nearly thrown off of his feet by the force of the blow. Sparks flew from his blade as he was pushed back. Giving a mighty cry, he swept his blade down and to the side, diverting the course of the flying sawblade. It dissolved into a thousand tiny shards of metal that then sped at Quel from behind, cutting into his entire back and right leg. He cried out in pain, doubled over and nearly passed out. Anger gave him focus beyond measure and with a swing of his soul cutter he collapsed the entire length of the corridor around them.

Selvittää screamed, Valkon cursed and Quel laughed.

* * *

Fear is known by many, but it is hard to share with the unlearned what true terror and despair is like. On that day Quel felt the dark emotions entering deep into the marrow of his being. Their escape from the doomed royal capital was not easy. They passed thousands of dead and met up with a large band of survivors, all of whom pledged themselves to protect the Princess. The protections that had been put in place around the Pit of Muhre, a place the Kestävä tribe used to imprison all of the beings too evil and dangerous to let go free, had fallen. Everything inside, horrors beyond your imagining, had been allowed to ravage the Vetus System. Someone or something had released them. The Kestävä would not go down so easily, they would not allow this to be a total victory. But that was all in the past. Nothing would ever be like it was.

Now, in the very surreal present, Quel was dying from blood loss and had a dozen new wounds all over his body to match the ones he had in his back from Valkon. Selvittää supported his weight on her left shoulder and the two of them staggered through the streets of Länis Tuuli, a small city hundreds of miles to the southeast of Kantäisa Syvä. It was in this town that they hoped to find one of the many hidden escape pods designed to safeguard the royal family. The Kestävä were nothing if not paranoid and it seemed it had paid off on this day.

But then fate is not always kind. In front of the hidden safe house containing the pod, with frightful stillness, stood a small army of their enemies. The fallen dead of the Kestävä tribe had been viciously transformed into lakastua, undead abominations who's disfigured state mirrored their weak spirit's torment. Dizzy and dead on his feet, Quel nonetheless stood to fight them. Their eyes permanently glassed over, the lakastua parted like the Red Sea for Moses, allowing something far worse to approach. It was a Tahrata Priestking, an anthropomorphic spider-man dressed in flowing robes. The Tahrata were the underlings of the Hämähäkit, another tribe like the Kestävä who had been wiped out a hundred years ago in the Blood Wars. Apparently some had survived. He raised his hand and crushed Quel's ribs with a mere gesture before telekinetically tossing him to land in a bloody heap.

"You are the last of the pure-blooded descendants of the Kestävä. You will die. I will skin you alive. There will be no mercy." It said to the Princess.

"Not while I'm here." Quel gasped, barely raising himself up off the ground, blood pooling around his broken body and a wet cough following his words. "BANKAI!" he yelled, a gale whipping through the street.

"It is my burden to bear!" Princess Selvittää screamed, raising her hands in a brilliant halo of light as she cast a holy spell.

The Priestking simply vanished, its eyes glowing briefly right beforehand.

The smoke cleared, revealing all three had fallen. The lakastua had been obliterated and the Priestking was dead. Crawling on his stomach, Quel neared the Princesses' side. She was badly wounded, bleeding her darkest arterial blood, her lifeblood, out onto the ground.

"Your name is Quel, right?" Her voice was very quiet and he had to strain to hear it.

"Yes."

"I have had a small crush on you since you entered my... service. I know about your past, where it was you... came from."

"Please Your Highness, you're dying. Let me go and get help, there's still time!"

She grabbed his face with her hand, gently yet firmly. "I never accomplished anything of meaning in my life Quel. I was only able to watch as my people were slaughtered around me... Don't let yourself be like me...don't be...powerless when you are...truly needed. Don't...be like...me."

Her hand fell from his face to smack deafeningly loud against the ground in a pool of her own blood.

Tears flowed down Quel's face. He screamed in rage and despair, experiencing death for the first time up close and personal. He had failed to protect her and so his regret and guilt were colossal. They seeped into his bones and turned them black with shame. He would honor her dying words and live on in his disgrace, forever chained to this moment. He would do what she had asked and spread the word of what had taken place here. He would live on, but a small part of him died on that day.

* * *

Author's Note: So yeah, comment and review if possible and let me know what you think of my writing style and the story too...


	2. 1 All Roads Lead to Cat-girls

_**Chapter One: All Roads Lead to Cat-girls**_

**Ivalice, Nalbina Fortress, September 10th 1391 a.c.**

"No," said Quel with determination in his voice. "I won't do it Gene."

"Aw come on Quel, she's more bark than bite and I know you'll like what you see," said Gene, with a roguish smile and glint in his eyes.

"That's not what I mean," Quel said tiredly.

"Even if she's a babe that most men would give their left balls to be with?" Gene asked with an evil smirk.

They were both young adult male humans sitting in a shadowy corner of a bar called the _Hosteler's Due_ in one of Nalbina's less reputable districts. Quel Tiin was a young unknown adventurer with hardly any money to his name and little to distinguish him from anyone else. He had blue eyes, pale skin, dishwater blond or light brown hair, a long ago healed broken nose that had reformed slightly askew and an unassuming aura about him that allowed him to blend in almost seamlessly in a crowd. His clothing was that of a common buccaneer: leather pants with metal leg armor over the top, covering his legs from the knees down; a white linen shirt with the collar open and upturned, exposing his collarbone and upper chest to the sun; metal gauntlets that protected his hands and wrists; and to finish off his attire Quel had four weapons strapped to his person. He had on a gun belt with two pistols holstered on his hips that he wore with such confidence it almost seemed to be laziness. Two swords were strapped to his back, the hilts sticking up behind his head and the lengths of the scabbards running alongside his spine and ending at his lower back.

Across from Quel sat a man who was slightly older and more experienced. Gene Starwind sat casually leaning back against the padding of the booth they were in, seemingly nonchalant in his attitude. If Quel didn't notice his eyes flickering around the room every few minutes he would have thought Gene careless. Gene was covered in countless scars with the most apparent of them being the two ones under his left eye, like two vicious claw marks. Gene was tanned handsomely and had dark eyes that always seemed to be either self confidant or smug, not many people could tell the difference. Women seemed to think him a dreamboat and he had at one time been quite the ladies man. Now he had Melfina, his sole lover, and his ladykiller days were long since gone. His hair was dyed red and he had earrings that also served as long distance communicators as well as a fashion statement. Gene's arsenal usually was just his big gun holstered on his right hip and today it was no different. In the heat of the desert Gene was just wearing his trademark black and red sleeveless shirt and pants with spacer boots.

"Just because you're a shameless pervert doesn't mean all men are Gene," Quel said with a sigh and a shake of his head. "I'm not interested in taking care of someone who can't take care of themselves. And besides, you still haven't told me why you want me to take this woman off your hands in the first place."

"Ah, well that's not a mystery. I want her off of my ship because she and Aisha are driving me nuts together. Two of them on my ship are enough to make my hairline recede if it goes on any longer. I know separating them will bring harmony back to my ship and my life," said Gene, a glimmer of tears rimming his eyes. "And I know you are the answer to my prayers."

"Go find some other innocent, you ham, you're not fooling anyone," Quel replied, mock disgust in his tone. "I remember Torendar after all."

"Oh yeah...Torendar." Gene said a bit sheepishly, rubbing his chin in thought. "Well I want you to meet her first before you turn me down. Come on, she and Aisha are at a table outside." Gene rose up from their booth.

"You think of everything, don't you Gene?" said Quel, rising up to follow Gene.

"A man has to try, right?" Gene grinned. "Besides you would've run if I had asked you to follow me."

"I would not!"

Closeby in Nalbina a man looked upon the _Hosteler's Due_ with greedy eyes. The soul cutter would finally be his. After all of these years, countless decades giving way to centuries, the pain of the long ago betrayal and death had bled out of him. Now all that remained was the desire for the blade, the coldness in the heart of hearts that fueled this man and, worst and best of all, the merciless skill in his craft that had allowed him to slay countless lives in his long search.

There would be no escape. No second chances existed, only darkness and death would claim his target.

It had been easy to excuse herself from the table and rush back to the ship to get her things. She didn't own much, all of her belongings could fit easily in one small duffle bag. It was time to vanish, preferably before Gene, Aisha and the others tried to force her to go with some guy they all agreed was "perfect" for her. Whatever the hell that meant. This one would never be cajoled or forced into doing anything she didn't want to do.

The day was a beautiful one, cumulus clouds soared regally across the sky from the east, a cool breeze shepherding them on their journey. With such a beautiful vista before her how could she not let her worries fall away and give into the bliss of the moment? Her smile was bright and her step was light as she started out on her own. Today was a good day and it could only get better for her.

A thuggy man in a pinstripe suit stepped out of an alleyway and barred her path. He was joined by a dozen of his fellows, all of whom had guns pointed at her.

"Guys, come on. Don't ruin such a beautiful day with violence," the girl pleaded.

The thugs just herded her off into an alleyway where their leader waited smoking in the dimness with the burning cigarette lighting up his face with every inhale of breath and the smoke shrouding his head with very exhale.

"Little Miss, we need to talk," he said calmly. "You owe us big time and we've come to collect. You didn't think you could run and hide from us forever, did you?"

"It's worked so far," she said with a shrug.

Quel wasn't usually one to get concerned, but this time he had an odd feeling that was urging him on with haste in his stride. A sense of importance filled him. The girl he was supposed to meet wasn't with Aisha. Aisha, after greeting Quel with a playful tackle, told them that she had excused herself to use the restroom…thirty minutes earlier. Gene and Aisha had gone back to their ship to look for her, arguing over what the proper amount of time it took to go to the bathroom took all the way, and Quel had decided he would look for her in the city while they did that. He was regarding a window display of baked goods when he heard a pained howl echo out of an alleyway nearby.

Moving closer to investigate he saw two disheveled men in suits fly out of the alleyway and land limp in the middle of the street, unconscious. Multiple gunshots echoed out of the alleyway. He just had to take a peek at what the commotion was. He discovered that the alleyway was experiencing a crazed melee as dozens of thug-types tried to assault a single young woman. She dodged bullets, broke limbs and gave concussions out like free samples in a grocery store. Never had Quel seen such an angel of devastation wade through that many armed and dangerous men without suffering any harm. Men went flying like big bags of meat, arcing high and slamming hard into the walls and ground of the alleyway. She was perfect in every way, she was gorgeous, graceful and strong. He couldn't get a look at her face because she had the hood of her cloak up over her head, casting her face in shadow, but if her body was any indication of her beauty he was hopelessly entranced. She dealt with the thugs so effortlessly that when Quel saw one readying a grenade he had to take a minute to realize she actually needed help. So he shot the would be bomber straight through his wrist, making him drop the grenade before he could pull the release switch. The man ran howling from the alley.

The young woman turned and looked over her shoulder at Quel, her strong feminine jaw barely peeking out of the shadows. "Thanks stranger, you helped a girl in a time of crisis."

"You didn't need much," Quel replied easily, holstering his pistol.

"It's the thought that counts," she replied with a coquettish smile, lifting up her duffel bag over one shoulder. "What's your name stranger?"

"Qu—,"

"HEY!" a man yelled at the other end of the alley behind the martial girl. Turning to look the girl lowered her shoulders like she sagged under some heavy weight.

"Don't you ever give up?!" she asked in angry annoyance.

The man's answer was to throw three grenades at her, which caused the brutalized thugs in the alley who were still conscious to scream in sheer terror and scramble desperately to get away. The girl ran at Quel with surprising speed, grabbed him by the hand and dragged him out of there. Explosions lit up the sky and sent a plume of smoke and fire into the air as they raced out of the alley mouth and down the street. Quel heard masonry collapsing back in the alley, he didn't want to know what had happened to the thugs caught in that blast. He could hear the grenade-thrower yelling back the way they had come, his words indistinct.

"Boy, that was close!" the girl said, joking as they ran down the street.

"What the hell—!" began Quel, stopping when he saw another group of thugs appear out of nowhere in front of them, the girl coming to a halt next to him. These guys must have been hiding in other alleys and shadowy areas to waylay them like this, but where they came from mattered little at the moment, the ambush had already been sprung. The girl let go of his hand and raised both of her's over her head in surrender. All ten or so of the thugs had automatic assault rifles pointed at Quel and the girl and all of them knew how to use them quite well, if their demeanor and casual stance indicated anything.

"Well I guess this is as far as I go," the girl said resignation plain in her voice, "Sorry for getting you mixed up in this with me stranger."

"No problem," Quel said calmly. Then, in a blazing instant of intense light and sound, all of the thugs clutched their hands and cried out as they fell. He had given no warning and had disarmed over ten men in under three seconds. No one was dead, but the amount of smoke coming from the barrels of Quel's pistols attested to his fury. Moaning filled the alley as the wounded men felt the pain of scorched legs, burned hands and singed pride. A small gust of wind swept down the street as he holstered his guns, making the girl's cloak ruffle in the wind for a moment.

"What _THE_ hell was _THAT_!?" she said incredulously, backing away a few steps and eyeing him with suspicion, arms raised to fend off any blow.

"Me saving our asses!" retorted Quel. "Now let's go!"

Grabbing the girl's arm, Quel took the lead, guiding her down a nearby alley, across another street, down another alley and back and forth, left and right, up and down and just about everywhere in Nalbina. He was taking as confusing a path as he could, all the while making his way back toward the _Hosteler's Due_. Time passed very quickly and when he stopped to catch his breath with the girl at his side two hours had already come and gone in the blink of an eye. They were three blocks from the bar, the street full of people. Some of the thugs in suits were walking down the street undoubtedly looking for them, scanning the faces of passersby. Dragging the martial girl into the mouth of a nearby alley, Quel tried to explain his idea to her.

"Do you trust me a little?" he asked her.

"Depends on what you intend," she replied evenly, becoming guarded.

"You see that bar over there, down on the other end of the street?" he said, pointing at the _Hosteler's Due_.

"Yep," she said blandly.

"Well I'm going to get us there without being seen, but in order to do that I need you to cover your eyes."

"Like hell I'll do that," she said calmly, amusement plain in her voice.

Just then angry shouting echoed from farther back down the alleyway, Quel knew they were out of time.

"Fine!" he said. "Take my hand and be quiet—please."

The please mollified what otherwise would have been an annoyed refusal and the girl stuck her hand out and looked back over her shoulder at the ruckus emanating down the alleyway.

Quel gripped the sword over his left shoulder with his right hand and whispered a few words, barely moving his lips. He didn't want this girl to hear what he was saying; words of power were dangerous in the wrong hands after all. His invocation caused the wind to spontaneously coalesce over the two of them and form shells around their frames. The wind quickly adhered to their forms as it raced across them both, just over their bodies, blowing so quickly it seemed to be reverberating all around them. And then, just as quickly, it was done.

The girl let out a small gasp, the first emote she had given since the invocation had begun.

"How—!" she began, tugging her hand out of his grasp, he heard ruffling sounds. Ostensibly she was feeling herself to make sure she was still tangible. "What did you do?" she asked, incredulously.

They were both invisible, without anything to give them away but their faint shadows.

"I made us invisible," he replied. "Now come on! We've got to get to that bar before we run into anymore trouble!"

Without further fussing he grabbed her hand (missing it twice) and they set off at a stealthy jog.

In the bar Quel was able to disengage their invisibility without being noticed, he timed its release right when the door closed so that it looked like a gust of wind had just blown in as the door banged open. Seeing an empty booth near the back of the establishment, Quel towed the mysterious girl over to it and plopped himself down once he had seated her like a proper gentleman. He sat tiredly, leaning onto the table for support and she sat with her hands in her lap sitting up straight, like a proper dainty lady. She looked all over the bar, assessing her situation and finding possible escape angles too if he had any idea of what her character was by now.

"So why did you bring me here?" she asked from beneath her hood, fingers linked together and hands resting on the table in front of her. She hadn't taken off her hood since he'd stumbled upon her, so he had no idea how she looked. He preferred to think of her as some gorgeous beauty, but truth was usually harder to bear than fantasy. He had a sinking feeling that she was as ugly as sin.

"Quick thinking. I was just in here with a friend of mine, though he might have left…"

The girl laughed and Quel thought he saw the shadow of a smile, literally. "You always this honest?" she asked.

"Yes...How can you tell I'm being honest?" he countered, semi-jokingly and semi-seriously.

"A woman's intuition," she teased back.

Silence developed between them. Both were busy staring at one another across the table and surveying all of the sights, sounds and smells that were all around them in the busy bar. A waitress suddenly broke the bubble of silence by arriving at their table.

"What'd be your orders?" she asked.

Gene plopped down next to Quel without warning. "We'll have two orders of hot fudge sundaes and one round of chocobo surprise, hold the droppings."

The waitress left to bring back their orders, but not without some understandably weird looks at Gene. With as busy as it was in the _Due_ today it wouldn't take long, nor would it arrive very quickly.

"_Gene_. Nice to see you again too," Quel said, after moving over a bit so Gene wasn't sitting on top of him. "Did you find her?"

"Yep," Gene said. "She wanted to leave without saying goodbye, but the fat lady hasn't sung yet."

"Ok, where is she?" asked Quel.

"Right in front of you," the girl said, turning to look at Gene under her hood. "So this is the guy you were going to hand me off on Gene?"

"Yep, isn't he like I told you he'd be?" replied Gene.

"Nope," she said simply. "He's more."

Quel was shocked, but he had been shocked worse before. "You were the girl Gene wanted me to ferry?" he exclaimed, then as an afterthought he did a small chuckle. "I do love irony."

"Yeah, well in my opinion this is just plain ridiculous," she said. "I want to get out of this town and get on to why I came to this rock to begin with. Why won't _YOU_ take me Gene?"

"Yeah why won't _YOU_ Gene?" echoed Quel.

"Because," Gene retorted. "I have a meeting in the Cavix system that I'm running late for and this is Aisha's problem to begin with."

"_MY PROBLEM!?"_ roared a female voice cracking with emotion and making every conversation in the bar come to a grinding halt. Quel slumped forwards and butted his head gently on the table a few times. The girl edged away from the angry voice as far as she could by sliding to the back of the cushion on her side of the booth. Gene sighed and turned towards the angry female voice. Aisha was an extremely attractive dark-skinned young woman with a long braid of white hair running down her back, furry brown cat ears, teal colored eyes and the most unique fashion sense in the room. She wore a white breastplate that doubled as a brassiere on the outside of her green flowing tunic with long sleeves that fell to around her mid thighs and dark form fitting leggings that ended in white boots.

"Aisha damn it, this _is_ your problem!" Gene said, a tad angry. "If you hadn't snuck her aboard my ship in the first place none of this would have happened!"

"You did what now?" Quel said, amused.

"We have bigger problems than you two arguing," said another woman, dressed in a red and white kimono, a yellow-orange overcoat, a matching white headband and carrying a wooden sword. Her hair was so black it shined blue and her skin was as pale as moonlight. She was Twilight Suzuka. The two contrasting beauties, dark skinned and loud Aisha and the pale skinned and pensive Suzuka, both came to stand next to the booth where Gene, Quel and the girl were seated.

"Hey Suzu!" Quel said, raising one hand up in salutation. A sudden blur of movement, so quick as to almost be missed, from Suzuka's sword hand later and Quel had a free trim on his bangs from "Suzu."

"I thought I told you never to call me that again Quel?" she asked calmly, eyes closed demurely, brow minisculely furrowed in consternation.

"Wait a minute!" Gene said. "Fight later. Suzuka, what's going on? What should we be worried about?"

"Still beautifully deadly I see Suzu…_ka_!" Quel said, half teasing but still leaning warily away from Suzuka.

"Those lowlifes who were pursuing us from before are surrounding this building as we speak," continued Suzuka, ignoring Quel completely.

"Uh-oh," said Aisha, looking around. "_HEY_! Where's Jim?"

"He went back to the ship," Gene said, now turning to look at the girl under the hood. "Now will you, or won't you go with Quelly here?" he said.

"I have no choice, so I guess I will travel with him for now," the girl shrugged. "He hasn't demonstrated the level of intelligence you said he possessed yet Gene."

"Oh-ho!?" exclaimed Quel sardonically. "Praise from Starwind on my intelligence? I'm insulted."

"Up yours," Gene said genially. "We're leaving. Make a hole for us would you Quel? For old time's sake, huh buddy?"

"Aw Gene," Quel said unhappily. "You know I like this place, but I guess in a situation like this I just can't complain." Looking around at the dimly lit, crowded and smelly bar he sighed. "It was such a nice bar too."

"Nya, nya! This is going to be fun!" said Aisha, her primal cat nature leaking forth.

"To be sure," said Suzuka. "I'll break left."

"I'll go right!" Aisha said, growling in delight. "Nyaaaaaanya!"

"And I'll smash down the center!" said Gene. All three were smiling.

"What the devil are you three talking about?" asked the girl.

"Their escape plan once I blast down that wall over yonder," Quel said as he stood up and stretched his back, reaching for the sky. He had nodded at the opposite wall, where a group of people were enjoying their meals and conversations at the moment, oblivious to what was about to happen to them. Since Aisha's loud outburst the other patrons of the bar had long since ignored the rowdy group, after all this was a bar and as long as no fights broke out people could be as loud and boisterous as they wanted.

All of that changed when Quel unsheathed the sword over his left shoulder and launched a ball of pure wind, wild and deadly in its beauty, at the wall. It blasted it outwards and sent everyone in between him and the wall flying in every imaginable direction. Screams erupted all over the bar as the dust cloud billowed out to envelope everything and everyone. Gene, Suzuka and Aisha ran out of the hole in the wall while Quel grabbed the girl by the hand and ran after them.

"Sorry about your bar!" he yelled at the stunned waitress bringing their food.

When he got out of the bar onto the debris filled street he ran over more than a few thugs dressed all in black suits, wearing sunglasses and toting automatic weapons. In the screen of dust Quel quickly lost sight of Gene and the two girls with him, but he didn't try too hard to find them. He chose an alley and ran down it tugging the girl along behind him. She wasn't putting up a fight and was pacing him easily enough so that he didn't have to literally drag her along behind him, thank god. After running for over a mile and going down many twisting and turning paths they stopped in a secluded stone square that had a fountain that fed into the ocean. They were at the back wall of the Nalbina fortress, the small city's namesake. This secluded area was situated between the wall of the fortress, two small buildings and the sea. The fountain was carved in the shape of four beautiful naked viera women. All four held vases high over their heads that water flowed out of, down their stone bodies and through a small aqueduct into the sea. It was quite a beautiful sight to behold such exquisite carvings of naked rabbit-women with sparkly water flowing and pooling around them, happily gurgling. Erotic too. The water formed a mini deluge that fed into the sea. Two park benches were next to the fountain, both across from where the water flowed down, facing the fortress. The fountain was at the edge of the square. A small stone staircase led down to the ocean's edge where women from the town probably washed their laundry and children came to swim in the heat. Every once in awhile a bigger wave would send a little bit of spray crashing up into the air at the edge of the square. A small decrepit door that had long since rusted shut lay within the wall to the fortress. The square was deserted.

Quel and the girl, still wearing her hood up, took this all in at a glance and sat down at one of the two benches, both breathing with a bit of exertion.

"So…," the girl said. "What now?"

"Some answers would be nice," Quel said. "Like who you are, where you want to go and who's chasing you for starters."

"We just met bub. I don't share with people I've just met," she said, shrugging her shoulders.

"Fine by me, just tell me what you can," Quel replied evenly.

"I don't owe you anything, so don't expect a single thing," the girl said defiantly.

"I figure you have your reasons," said Quel. "But don't expect me to take you with me if I don't even know who's hunting you."

The girl was momentarily silent and then she pulled the hood back and off her head. Under the light of Ivalice's sun Quel beheld for the first time the face of the woman who would captivate his heart and fill his life with wonder, sappiness intended. Looking in her eyes he beheld all the things he never knew he had wanted to see in another's eyes. Though he didn't see any like reaction spark to life in her eyes he knew from what his parents had taught him when he was very young that it was always the man first who fell in love, or at the very least if the man fell in love first it hopefully portended a successful relationship. Hopefully, anyway. It wasn't really a foolproof notion he had been taught, but it was highly romantic and classic in its simplicity.

To describe her is a venture fraught with the perils of inaccuracies. She was sublime, yet also butch; delicate, yet invincible. She was well muscled from a hard life. She had golden eyes, literally the color of a deep amberlike gold. Her skin was dark from both her heritage and the amount of time she spent under the sun. Her hair was silvery and white, with cat ears sticking out of her head with matching silver fur and tufts on the ends. Her face had three lines of white face paint like whiskers running under her eyes on both cheeks.

Time passed and seemed to stop under the light of that Ivalician sun as the two of them gazed silently at one another. In that moment an eternity passed, a moment that lasted forever. The foundations of the universe, the secret meaning of life itself, felt almost within sight in that moment. Then it passed, like a forgotten dream dispersed on the wind. Quel was left there in a slight daze, feeling foolish and more than a bit disturbed that she had caused such a reaction in him. He immediately became guarded and suspicious, destroying the moment entirely.

"My aim is the Tournament of Might held on Despian Isle south of here," the girl said, breaking the silence and the mood like only she knew how to do. "My name is Saida, you don't need to know my last name."

"So all I'm doing is ferrying you to Despian Isle?" asked Quel surprised and a bit disappointed, though he didn't let the later emotion show.

"That's right," she said, suddenly becoming wary. "Why?"

"What about those guys chasing you?"

"What about them?" she shot back, misguided defiance plain in her eyes.

Quel had lost his patience and grew venomously sarcastic. "Oh, I dunno," he said contemptuously. "Just maybe who the hell are they?!"

Saida paused for a second, evaluating his mood. "Their slavers," she said lamely, before abruptly changing the conversation. "Aren't you going to be a gentleman and tell me _your_ name good sir?"

"Ah," he said grinning. "I'm prejudiced towards verbal bullies, so don't expect me to roll over for you just because you're pretty."

"Oh, so you think I'm pretty?" she teased. "Thanks…I think."

"Having a fat ass is more attractive than a fat head you know," he replied, dryly.

"You get told that a lot I bet," she winked.

Quel shook his head, admitting defeat by the expression on his face. "My name is Quel and you Saida can make a very annoying first impression."

He held his right hand out to shake hands and after a moment of hesitation Saida grasped his hand firmly and shook.

"That's what I've been told," she said nonchalantly, eyes gazing far away.

"Alrighty then," Quel said, amused. "Come on, let's get out of here. I'll accept you aboard my ship now lady."

Back at the spaceport, in his reserved hangar, Saida and Quel found Gene had already left, but he had positioned a Balloon-o-Gram outside of Quel's ship so that they couldn't possibly—without intentionally doing so—miss it. A Balloon-o-Gram was an egg shaped rocket with a retracting screen that would display video messages.

"Oh great, a Balloon-o-Gram," said Quel, glumly.

"A what?" asked Saida, thoroughly confused.

She received her answer when the Balloon-o-Gram came to life with a spark, delivering its message:

"Greetings [QUEL & SAIDA]! You lucky devil(s)! [GENE STARWIND & CO.] has just sent you…a galactic greeting!"

"Here we go," muttered Quel. Saida just blinked, nonplussed at what was unfolding before her eyes.

The Balloon-o-Gram's screen slide apart to reveal a mini TV screen and shortly after that a video began to automatically play. On it Gene, Aisha, Melfina and Suzuka could all be seen on the bridge of the _Outlaw Star_, their grappler ship.

"Hi Saida and Quel, sorry we couldn't be here to see you off, but business calls!" said Gene, smugness dominating his features as usual.

"Yeah right Gene, you just wanted to make sure Saida went with Quel," Jim Hawkins, Gene Starwind's partner and right hand man said irately. Jim may have been a young teenager, but his IQ was off the charts. Suzuka, the ethereal beauty of the crew stood quietly in the background. She didn't look too pleased, or too unhappy; in fact she was entirely ambivalent. Aisha was her usual self, jumping with pent up energy and perkiness as she shouted "Hellos!" and "Sayonaras!" right behind Gene's head, making him grimace from the force of her voice. His hair seemed to billow and bend from the force of her lungs as well. Melfina was quiet and gentle, as was her way.

"Farewell you two, next time we meet remind me to sing that song you like so much Quel. Goodbye Saida! It was nice to meet you!" said Melfina, Gene's lover and partner. She was the heart that bound the _Outlaw Star_ crew together. Her personality was full of kindness and serenity; anger was as rare for her as it was common for Gene.

Gene then stepped forwards a bit and took up the majority of the screen, his nose hair needed to be trimmed it seemed. "I know it was bad of me to leave you guys like this without seeing you off, but I'll make it up to you when we meet again real soon!"

"Hey," said Jim, suddenly thinking of something. "Aren't we going really far away for a while?"

"Don't tell them that yo—!" yelled Gene, right before the time limit of the Balloon-o-Gram cut off. The last image they had of the _Outlaw Star_ crew was of Jim and Gene vehemently focused on one another, with Gene appearing to strangle Jim, Jim smacking Gene over the head with a wrench and the three women in background looking on. All three were beginning to react to the scene in front of them in various ways. Aisha was in mid-leap, about to tackle Gene and Jim, Melfina was saying something to try and make them stop and Suzuka was gripping her wooden sword in what to those who knew her was a precursor to action, which was a scary thing. Suzuka could split a car in half with one wave of her "wooden" sword, or she could simply cut a blade of grass in half. Her power and control were legendary. The melee wasn't nearly over yet.

Silence reigned when the mini broadcast was over; both Saida and Quel had expressions of disbelief pasted on their faces. The Balloon-o-Gram blasted off and shot away up into the atmosphere, bound for who knew where and leaving a trail of white smoke.

"Soooo…"said Quel, conversationally trying to fill the silence.

"Presumptuous of them to think we'd stick together," Saida said, grouchily. "It's not like we like each other, or anything."

"I know, right? It's almost like a matchmaking service, though I have to admit that Gene makes for an appalling matchmaker."

"Totally, but this is just a one way ride pretty boy," she tossed her hair, settling it behind her shoulders. "Which one is your ship?"

"Step this way madam," Quel bowed and gestured with his outstretched right arm towards a more secluded niche of the spaceport where his ship's hangar bay lay half hidden in shadow.

When they got to the shadowy hangar and Saida beheld Quel's ship for the first time she had only one comment.

"It's dinky…"

"Size doesn't always matter. It's more on how you use it."

"I bet you tell all the ladies _that one_," she laughed.

He blankly stared a hole into Saida's head, which when she looked up and saw made her laugh all the more. Quel walked over to his ship and entered a code on the keypad that was set into the hull next to the boarding ramp. The ramp itself was in the forward belly of his ship. The ramp appeared out of the bottom of the ship and slowly lowered to the ground with an electronic groan. Quel walked forwards and stood at the bottom of the ramp.

"Are you ready to join me in a secluded and completely private domicile Saida?"

"Why yes I am Quel, because I know I'm at least two times stronger than you physically."

Somehow it seemed they were being inordinately playful. Quel forced some somberness into his expression and stopped using so many innuendos.

"Alright Saida this is my ship and I only have two rules: clean up after yourself and don't destroy anything."

"Sounds easy enough," Saida said as she tossed her duffle bag over her left shoulder and strode forwards, leading the way onto the ship.

"What's your ship's name anyway?" she turned and asked as Quel followed her up the ramp.

Quel smiled up at her. "I call her the _Nacht_."

"The what?" she asked.

"It means 'the Night,'" he said seriously, not a trace of mischief on his upturned blue-eyed face.

"…I see…pfft," Saida was having a hard time maintaining her composure.

"Alright now what's wrong?" he asked, a tad forcefully. "Spit it out, what is it?"

"Come on, it's corny as hell that you call it 'The Night'," then she couldn't help it anymore and she broke down with a case of gut wrenching belly laughter.

Quel, feeling slightly annoyed at her looked up at his ship fondly.

"Don't mind her _Nacht_, she'll see how amazing you are soon enough."

The _Nacht_ was a small airship that looked very similar to a lady-bug type insect from above. It was V shaped with the living quarters being at the bottom tip of the V. Apart from the living quarters the rest of the airship was actually just folding-wings like the _Strahl_'s, with six glossair rings on the ship, two big ones underneath the forward most portion of the wings, where the wings joined the main ball of the ship itself near the bottom of the V shape, and four smaller glossair rings along the bottom of the wings themselves. The only weapons the ship boasted were four powerful rotating cannons that were sunken in slightly along the outside of the wings with two at the tips of the wings and two in the middle of the wings. The _Nacht_ had four landing struts that made you think of an insect. The cockpit was oval shaped with the boarding ramp leading up into the ship from the front, like a mouth, and the interior of the ship was sparse. There was the cramped entryway with storage closets, which led to the main room that served as a living room, kitchen and storage area. From the living room three doors led to three different places: back to the entryway, forwards to the cockpit and left to the one and only sleeping quarters. The cockpit was just like every other ship: oodles of buttons and controls to mess with, a viewport and three chairs to sit in, including the pilot's, and scant little in the way of free space. The viewport was oval and had six big reinforced metal bars in a curvy grid pattern along its rim, bisecting the window and reducing visibility but reinforcing the cockpit at the same time. The sleeping quarters had a bed, a storage chest and one other small room that adjoined it: the bathroom. The ship was about the size of a medium sized whale or krayt dragon. She wasn't a big ship, but neither was she small. Her paintjob was a metallic midnight blue and black, with a single big zigzag of a slightly lighter band of metallic gray all along the wings, like teeth. She had the look of a deadly wolf wasp, poised to strike at any foolish enough to offend her.

Saida deposited her things in the sleeping quarters while Quel arranged his bedroom for her to take over for however long she'd be staying with him.

"Where will you sleep?" she asked.

"In the living room on an inflatable mattress," he replied.

"Does this bathroom unit have a sanisteam?"

"Nope, only an old fashioned shower," Quel said as he made the bed and cleaned up his tossed about belongings.

They were steadily becoming used to each other's presence and it took less than ten minutes for Quel and Saida to make room for her belongings and move to the cockpit for takeoff.

An hour later, as they flew over the inland sea between the continents of Kerwon and Ordalia heading south-southwest Quel was busy trying not to fall asleep as he flew five thousand feet over the blue ocean with the blue sky reflecting in his blue eyes making him feel a bit blue. Saida seemed to be napping in the copilot's chair and had been sitting there since shortly after their clearance and takeoff from Nalbina. She suddenly sat up straight, making him jolt awake as well and focus on her as he continued flying.

"I only want you to take me as far as Shetoshia," she said quietly, looking straight ahead.

"Ok," frowning slightly he checked his altitude again. "You already stated that before you know."

"Don't get comfortable around me, I'm not your friend."

He glanced over at her curiously. "Something crawl up your ass an' die madam?" Seeing her stiffen he hastily continued. "Because comfortable or not I dislike rudeness more than most people do. I don't know you from beans, but that doesn't mean we have to be rude to each other. I mean, we've only just met, I hardly think we know each other ye—"

She laughed, the ringing sound of it making Quel stop in mid sentence. "Do you always act this nervous around a woman?"

"No," he answered simply. She looked at him expectantly. "Not usually," he grumbled out.

Smiling, she reclined in her seat. She chose not to continue talking, her silence conveying more than words could. Quel was aghast at his situation, not quite sure if she had accepted him, snubbed him or dismissed him entirely. Or even why he cared. Despite all of this a comfortable silence developed and they passed the day away gazing out on the lovely splendor of the sea, without a care in the world.


	3. 2 Echoing Sentiments

_**Chapter Two: Echoing Sentiments**_

**Ivalice, Shetoshia, September 12th, 1391 a.c.**

Two days had passed since their flight from Nalbina. The Tournament of Might was beginning today and the whole city was celebrating because of it. This was the free city of Shetoshia, an ancient town that had a healthy underworld of crime, including one of the biggest crime syndicates in all of Ivalice. In 434 Old Valendian (1127 a.c.) the Rozarrian Empire established a military outpost on Despian Island and used it as a relay station for explorations into the forbidding continent of Kerwon. The relay station was reinforced and huge siege cannons known as Behemoth Teeth were set in place on the eastern and northern sides of the relay station. They were an astounding thirty feet long, twenty feet tall, seventeen and a half feet in circumference and their caliber was a mind boggling 850 cm. The Rozarrian Empire wasn't able to make more than a few hundred of these super cannons and they were so large and so heavy that wherever they were constructed was unfortunately where they would remain. Highly unwieldy and impractical they went out of popularity after quite a few debacles, but Shetoshia boasts the biggest collection with six of them on the northern face of the city and eight on the eastern face.

In 552 Old Valendian (1245 a.c.) the relay station was abandoned by the Rozarrian's and left to decay. Years later, in 566 Old Valendian (1259 a.c.) the abandoned facility was reoccupied by various sky pirates, brigands and other darker sorts. These various parties then decided to build a grand "free city" and thus Shetoshia was born. The city sprawls atop a high steppe with the north and east portions of the city built at the edge of a seaside cliff with the cannon emplacements facing seawards. The southern and western edges of the city face flat scrubland with little if anything to take note of. Now the city itself is built in a depression of land so it is bowl shaped with the center of the city being at the bottom of the bowl and the walls being the rim of the bowl. Sandstone buildings, painted white to deflect the intense sunlight, are all that can be seen and all of them are of varying sizes and shapes. Three major buildings to take note of are the arena, the aerodrome and the fortress. The arena is built of a darker brown stone and is the tallest building in the city and is located near the very center of the city at the bottom of the bowl. The aerodrome is located on the northwestern edge of the city next to the sea and has a grand vista of the whole surrounding area. The fortress is built of sandstone and is two times larger than any other building around it. It's built in a quadrangle and sits near the arena at the center of the city. The city itself greatly resembles Mos Espa and even Rabanastre to a smaller degree as well.

Quel and Saida had registered in the Tournament of Might the previous day and were ready for the preliminaries to begin. They had little time left to wait, the tournament's opening ceremony was just concluding. Underneath the arena there was a labyrinth of connecting tunnels that served many purposes and here also was the main area where all of the contenders were gathered, eying each other as they waited for the tournament to finally begin. Quel and Saida stood next to one another, enjoying a comfortable silence as they both eyed the competition. Then the applause rose to an incredibly high roar that echoed down through the floor to the gathered contenders and the officials by the door began to call names. There were around three-hundred people competing in this year's tourney. The arena itself was partitioned off into six smaller rings so that many different matches could take place on at once. An hour passed underneath the ground and with a jolt, Quel heard his name called. He glanced over his shoulder once at Saida before leaving. Her expression was hard to read, but he thought it was one of faith, or was that expectation…? Following his guide, Quel walked down a hallway, turned left twice up two staircases and found he was looking out onto the six rings of the arena that he had only seen once this morning.

The sunlight was dizzyingly bright and five of the six arenas were currently in use, with paired competitors wailing on each other without end. Killing your opponent was an immediate disqualification, but any weapon was allowed as long as you didn't kill. He was led out through the small corridors between the thirty foot high metal fences that ringed the six smaller arenas, until he reached his first match. Quel's opponent was a young woman, robed in white with her face hidden by the cowl of a deep hood. The judge of their match rattled off the rules to both of them and then yelled "BEGIN!" before running off the stage with absolutely no propriety. The girl was already moving before the judge had taken three steps, aiming a gnarled wooden and metal staff at Quel's head and crying out a single word in a foreign language. A ball of light shot out from the tip of her staff and zoomed toward Quel's head, Quel ducked it and it exploded loudly and brightly behind him, creating a bright flash of light and sound and wind. Turning to look, Quel saw a wall of smoke billowing behind him.

'_Note to self: don't get hit by the little-balls-of-doom.'_

The girl's next attack was to summon forth a storm of the light balls, shooting out at least thirty of the appalling things at Quel. He responded by simply vanishing and reappearing behind her, where he seemingly looked at her and she flew up and out of the ring. The thirty, or so, balls of light exploded like a bunch of pretty fireworks where he had been standing just a second ago. Shocked, the robed girl let out a piercing "Kyaaaaaaa!" as she flew through the air, landing in the lap of a local shoe cobbler in the stands a good thirty feet away from the ring. Quel had his first victory, to the outrage of the young female wizard and the awe of the spectators, but don't be confused. A match of this quality was common, for in this Tournament of Might ability users of every kind were a common sight.

Once a competitor had won one match they were free to do as they pleased as long as they were ready for their next fight. Quel used his free time wisely by first using a restroom and then getting a snack to eat. The smell of onion rings made his stomach growl, so he drifted over to one of the vendors selling them and bought some. The competition was fierce, with energy blasts and spells flying around the arena with the sound of metal clanging from more physical and less magical fights echoing just as loudly. It didn't take long for Saida to appear for her own preliminary match.

Saida's first opponent was a well muscled man in his mid thirties who, though Quel couldn't hear what he said, seemed to anger her. He had a creepy expression on his face; he must've declared himself an enemy to all women, or at least the dangerous one in front of him. Obviously this six-foot seven, two-hundred and fifty pound man was confidant of his quick and easy victory against a five-foot three, one-hundred and thirty pound woman. The match lasted five seconds, just long enough for him to take a single step towards Saida and for her to punch the air in his general direction, releasing a shock wave that was strong enough to send him flying out of the arena, over the heads of two other competitors (who both ducked) and crash painfully into the opposite wall—a good two hundred feet away. The impact of his crash had forced him one and a half feet into the wall, making a nice crater with cracks spiraling out from the hole in the previously whole arena wall. Quel, along with just about everyone else in the arena, was instantly afraid of Saida. Acting happy and looking like a warrior goddess, Saida fist pumped, smiled to the crowd and walked out of the ring prettily. The remaining matches continued, but the day's drama was coming to an end. Saida's fight had been the highlight of the day, earning more hushed whispers than anyone else's. Quel wasn't surprised when Saida sat down next to him. He had unobtrusively made room for her when he had first found this seat and he knew that her cat-like eyesight had spotted him when she first came out from underneath the arena. It was still a pleasant surprise when she sat down next to him.

"You did well," Quel said quietly, eyes focused on the arena.

"My opponent wasn't that strong," Saida picked up and began to eat Quel's remaining onion rings. "He was a pushover without sense."

"Yeah, my first opponent was easy too," Still facing the arena, Quel looked at Saida sidelong. "Tomorrow the real fun begins. You ready?"

"Of course I am! Bring it on I say! Don't expect me to go easy on you if we meet in the ring either pretty boy." Her mischief was palpable in the air with that expression of hers.

"I don't, but I don't think we'll have to fight."

"Why do you say that?" The onion rings were gone, utterly consumed. Saida rubbed off any crumbs on her mouth with the back of her hand and began licking said hand like a cat would.

"A feeling," he smiled at Saida and silently wondered what the morrow would bring. _Hopefully it won't be too boring_

He had no idea.

The second day of the tournament was completely different from the first. The temperature was considerably hotter on this day and instead of there being six smaller rings there was one giant ring in the center of the arena taking up 90% of the ground space. The six rings had been deconstructed during the night in a frenzy of activity. More spectators had come from far and wide to witness the tournament, with many of them having their own private viewing boxes. Quel's aim today was far from winning his bout in the tournament; he was aiming much higher—literally. Saida's fight was early on in the day and she won it quickly with her usual gusto, sending her opponent flying out into the stands to flatten some poor spectator. Saida and Quel were still sitting next to one another this day too, enjoying the festive atmosphere. Getting up to leave, Quel received a raised eyebrow from Saida, her silent way of asking him where he was going.

"Bathroom," he lied.

She paid him no more attention and turned back to watch the matches, consequently not noticing which direction he went in. His destination was one of the private boxes where something undeniably shifty was occurring and being the curious Gemini that he was Quel just _had_ to go and look. He was following his curiosity over some of the rumors traveling through Shetoshia. His target was one of the highest and most luxurious private boxes, which also had maroon colored canvas cloth draped over it, blocking out the sun and also any unwanted prying eyes. The box was almost literally a box: it was suspended over the arena on reinforced metal stilts set into the wall of the arena, shaped like an egg, had only one long cyclopean slit on the front middle section for viewing and one entrance at the back. Two Archadian Knights in full plate armor stood at rigid attention on either side of the door and the soft chatter of men's voices could be heard from within. Quel hid behind a nearby support pillar, scrutinizing his approach vectors. It came as no surprise to him that he heard a voice in his head caution him to leave well enough alone.

_You really shouldn't be going in there Quel. Why risk it? _said Koe, Quel'sinner voice.

_You already know why Koe. Something reeks from inside there and I'm going to investigate it, _Quel furrowed his brow slightly. _Don't tell me you're not curious about who's in there?_

_No, it's not that it's just…The wind is erratic…_

_How? _Quel teleported onto the roof of the private box and unsheathed his cutlass to try and cut a small hole in the roof of the canvas cloth that covered the top of the box.

_It is unpredictable and what it's saying doesn't make any sense. Something in this city is boding ill for us is all that I can feel._

_That's nothing new. _Dropping down into the shadows at the back of the tent Quel was unafraid and silent as death itself, only not nearly as scary. He saw two men in deep conversation in front of him sitting in high backed plush chairs watching the arena fights; the rest of the private box was cloaked in shadows. He sensed no one else besides the two men in the chairs so he focused on their conversation. He had landed a good twenty feet back and to the left of the exit in one of the darkest corners of the box. Quel(and Koe) listened to the two men talk with one another and they drank in all of the juicy and sordid details of the conversation.

"I say Petrus," the pudgy one on the right said in a high simpering voice. "What do you think the chances of that violent feline lass winning are?"

"High Bastian. Her skill in battle is almost without equal," replied the man on the right, slender of frame and with a sharp cold voice that dripped with arrogance. "Her only competition seems to be that deformed fellow in the cloak and that young rogue who teleports around the ring."

"Ah yes! That boy is fun to watch!"

"He is an arrogant fool," said Petrus with sharp finality, ending the conversation.

Quel's eye twitched ever so slightly in irritation.

Silence reigned for the next couple of minutes until the simpering Bastian, clearly the lackey of the cold Petrus, spoke up again.

"Now, uh Petrus?" Bastian suddenly sounded and looked nervous, fiddling with the arm of his chair and emitting the smell of fear into the air. "Can we get down to the reason on why you called me here today?"

"Yes," Petrus rearranged his robes, making the voluminous sleeves billow out revealing how dark crimson and shining white they shone in the light. "The Senate and I are displeased Bastian and we intend to collect on your debts. You have wasted our time and energy for far too long an—,"

"But I tri—,"

"DO NOT INTERRUPT!" roared Petrus, causing Bastian to flinch mightily and cower down in his seat. Petrus took a moment to collect himself, or make Bastian stew, and then continued. All was quiet; the sounds from the arena were muffled by the thick canvas and wood walls, not to mention the distance from the ground lessening any sound from outside.

"You and your brethren have few options Bastian. You can either pay off your debts to us in one fell swoop, agree to serve us until we deem your debt returned, or die."

The private box was suddenly very quiet and though Koe didn't actually speak Quel could feel him silently saying "I told you so" and urging Quel to get out of there. Quel ignored him and stayed glued to the scene before him.

"Y-y-you can't b-be ser-i-ious!"

"I am and you had better be as well, for your family's sake if not mine Bastian."

"Leave my family out of this, this has nothing—!"

"THIS has EVERYTHING to do with them! You're a man Bastian, you provide for your family. Therefore you also allowed them to fall into your debt along with you! Their fate is the same as yours!"

Bastian was stunned into silence and then he sighed heavily. "Alright Petrus, I've known you for a long time and I'm not foolish enough to cross you or your Senate, but I must have time to contact my associates and tell them this news."

"I leave for the Colonies in three days. You have until then to give me an answer."

"Thank you, thank you Petrus! I promise you will have one by then!"

Quel didn't need to see anymore, so he silently left the way he had come in. He left no trace of his presence...aside from the hole in the roof.

Quel's next fight was two hours after his adventure in the private box and his opponent wasn't much to brag about. A dual sword wielder, he lacked any kind of special ability and could only swing his blades around haphazardly, hoping to hit something. Most of the time he just ran at someone, swinging his blades crazily and tried to intimidate his opponent by laughing evilly. Quel simply teleported behind him and chopped him on the side of the head with his wrist, knocking him out cold. He received a lot of booing for his effort. The crowd was displeased at such an easy victory. After that anticlimactic fight it was time for the quarter-finals and this was when things really heated up. A contender Quel and Saida had somehow missed suddenly caught their attention when he tossed a six-foot four, three-hundred pound man across the arena and into the stands—with one arm! This new guy was huge, heavily muscled, bearded and…obnoxious. He called himself Chuldo, King of Destruction and he had a bark far worse than his bite, which was saying something. He stood at a height of at least twelve to fifteen feet, had a beard (like I already said) and had his long straight brown hair tied in an unbraided ponytail that stuck straight up and back over his head. He wore plate armor that was dented and scratched from many a fight, but it was well taken care of and in good shape. A young girl of no more than eight tailed Chuldo wherever he went, she had on shorts, sandals, a t-shirt with her midriff bare and a small vest and goggles to finish it off. Her long hair was in two unbraided and straight pigtails that stuck up like horns, with only string tying it together on the ends. This unlikely duo strolled around the arena, boisterous as two seagulls on a hot summer day. Quel took an immediate liking and disliking to them. Saida lowered her cat-ears in annoyance over their loudness, but gazed at them with open curiosity.

"He looks strong," she said distractedly. "And that girl looks sharp too."

"He is appallingly huge and she does look sharp," agreed Quel. "I think we will be seeing a lot more of them from now on."

"No doubt about that," Saida agreed, stretching and yawning loudly.

The Tournament of Might was renowned for what came next. The pace and endurance needed to survive until the semi-finals was unheard of and usually illegal in most other official tourneys. Day two of the Tournament of Might called for a test of endurance to whittle them down even more. Every contestant was required to take a fifty pound rock and go stand out in the blistering heat of the desert beyond the walls of the city, holding the stone above their heads the entire time. A judge was set to watch each and every contestant from the luxury and safety of a shaded umbrella. Only the top twenty contestants would be allowed to continue. The record for this test had been set ten years earlier by a famous warrior ronso from Spira. He had lasted five hours before exhaustion overtook him. This year's roster was made of stuff equally as fierce as that same warrior, so the tournament was all abuzz with excitement and expectation. The contestants each retrieved their fifty-pound rocks, marched out into the blistering heat and had a staring contest with their own personal judge(who was undoubtedly sitting under an umbrella sipping cognac or some other cool drink, probably with nice, moist, wet ice in it to cool it down. The bastards.).

The number of contestants still standing after the first day and a half of the tournament was 234, substantially higher than the previous four years of the tournament. 216 were eliminated within the first hour. The one-hundred plus degree weather was scorching and everyone who still stood at this time was coated in sweat and most were flagging from heat exhaustion and dehydration. The desert of Despian Isle was merciless and deadly; famously so. There were old stories that told of fierce sandstorms that literally ripped the flesh off the bones of those unwary enough to be outside during one, but those stories were high fantasy. Nonetheless they still made one pause and look with grim respect out on the arid landscape of Despian Isle, wondering why the hell anyone would choose to build a city here. The answer to that question was, of course, greed. The Rozarrian Empire and the Archadian Empire rarely if ever paid Shetoshia any attention, which allowed crimes of all sorts to prosper freely and happily on this isle. The fact that it was a hellhole mattered little in comparison to the flow of money.

Meanwhile, the remaining contestants began to drop like flies in this dreadful heat where even flies refused to flutter. 18 contestants soon became 13 after thirty minutes of fever filled pain, which became 11 after another thirty minutes of fire and brimstone of the mind, which became 6 after another hour of indescribable agony, which became 4 hopeless heat crazed loons, which remained 4 brain-fried loons...This deadlock continued and as you can guess it was our intrepid lunatics who remained utterly steadfast and deathly thirsty during this time. Quel, Saida, Chuldo and one other contestant stayed determined to be the last one standing. Every last one of them had shaky arms and dripped sweat like a leaky fountain. The day was half over and the sun was beginning to trek back down towards the western horizon. Finally Quel and then the fourth contestant both gave out within ten minutes of each other and it was down to only Saida and Chuldo…an unlikely pair. Saida managed to go another thirty minutes and just as her arms were beginning to go numb Chuldo fell over like a tree. Saida whooped in victory and fell over in relief. Quel came out and helped her to her feet, where she shoved him gently away and stood on her own power. Chuldo hoarsely declared his disbelief over having been beaten by a woman in strength, making Saida have a terrifying face even as exhausted as she was. Sexism seemed to trigger a side of Saida that was frightening to behold.

The second day of the Tournament of Might was over, with most of the contestants eliminated and the third day was on everyone's mind as the remainder of this day vanished forever.

Everyone was granted a long rest and the roster for the quarter finals was revealed at the end of the day in the early evening. Saida and Quel would meet in the semi-finals unless one of them lost, but it looked like Saida and Chuldo would meet up if both of them lasted for two more rounds. The night descended rapidly and Quel retired with Saida to their hotel. They had chosen rooms directly across the hall from each other. Their respective sleeping was blissful and they returned to the arena separately the next day ready for action. Quel found Chuldo harassing Saida when he got to the arena.

"YOU! LASS! What be yer secret!?"

"My secret?!" replied Saida, blinking.

"Yes! How did you beat me in the test of endurance?" Chuldo's eyes were bugging out of his head and he looked like he had seen a ghost.

"It's simple really," she said calmly. "I'm half Ctarl Ctarl."

"I see and what be this 'Kit-Arl Kit-Arl' you speak of?" Chuldo looked comically earnest now, blinking in the bright sunlight.

"My species…" said Saida, deadpan.

A moment of silence passed as Chuldo awkwardly looked between Saida and Quel, the young girl behind him sighed.

"Chuldo yer tact is like a fiend's breath," said the young girl angrily. "Howdy, m' name's Dong Dong and this be my no good pa Chuldo."

Quel and Saida shared a glance. "Hi," they said in unison.

Quel got down on one knee and looked Dong Dong directly in the eye. "I suspect you know what a Ctarl Ctarl is then little lady?"

Dong Dong regarded him cautiously and then she suddenly began to blush a bright red. "Yes I dew! Ctarl Ctarl's be a legendary race,"

Saida had a pained grin on her face. She knew what was coming next.

Quel nodded at Dong Dong and urged her to continue.

"They be famous fer their strength an' insane tempers."

Saida sighed and shrugged. "We only destroy a city every now and then and it's not like every Ctarl Ctarl is like that. We have a lot of superstition surrounding us."

Knowing full well that they were all standing next to a Ctarl Ctarl themselves and in the middle of a city, Chuldo, Dong Dong and Quel stayed silent.

Greetings were passed all around as the four made their way into the arena proper and parted cordially, with Chuldo and Dong Dong heading to the underground area of the arena and Saida and Quel going to find seats. The day passed in a hot blur with drawn out fights under the blistering sun lasting hours as the competitors used every ounce of strength and power they had to win. But power doesn't always guarantee victory and some matches were won by those clever enough to win with their minds. When midday came it was Quel's turn and Quel grandiosely entered the arena using a teleport technique, jumping directly from his bench in the back of the stands to the edge of the ring. His teleportation disrupted Saida in mid-nap, causing her to jolt out of her nap and curse loudly. Quel's opponent was an ordinary human man in his mid thirties with nondescript clothes and a nondescript appearance. He felt dangerous, so Quel kept his distance and mimicked the guy's movements as they circled each other. He carried no weapons and though Quel wielded two swords in this fight (his pistols had been confiscated as overkill) he somehow felt it would be best to fight bare handed against this opponent. Knowing full well of Quel's abilities thus far, the crowd was deathly quiet with only a mournful wind blowing as background noise. Then the guy made his move by running—correction—leaping across the entire arena in five quick touchdowns. His toes barely touched the ground and where they did touch the stone cracked from the force of it. Being reckless, and wanting to give the crowd a good show, Quel, teleported behind the guy right when he was about to touch down for the third time, timing it perfectly to strike when he was least prepared to react. This nondescript man read his mind and was swinging his left leg out and back for a kick straight to his head as he appeared. Quel blocked with his forearms and was sent flying through the air, flipping backwards and landing on his feet on the very edge of the ring. He didn't have time to breath as the guy leapt at an even quicker pace straight towards him, creating small craters where his feet touched down this time. Quel wasn't overly concerned about the ground, after all it was an old arena, but he was concerned over the fact that he was standing at the edge of the arena with nothing behind him but an early elimination. He leapt towards the man and they collided in midair, trading multiple blows with their fists as they fell the few feet to the ground. Quel widened the gap between them by slamming his right elbow into the guy's torso and putting the majority of his weight behind the blow, sending his opponent skidding backwards a few feet. Quel, quick as lightning, used this small gap to its fullest effect by drawing symbols in the air with his right pointer finger. His fingers trailed red energy and then as he finished his whole body glowed bright red for an instant.

"Geki!" he roared.

His opponent froze in mid step and the red glow that had just faded from Quel now permeated his opponent's body, pinning him in place. Quel jumped forwards and smashed his fist into the man's stomach, knocking the wind out of him and toppling him to the ground. Unable to move lying on the ground shining a bright red color, the man had lost. The crowd roared its pleasure and Quel bowed to his opponent before releasing him from his bindings. When he got back to his seat he found Saida regarding him intently.

"What's the matter?" he asked, looking around as he did so to make sure they weren't being watched or listened to.

"That technique you used to freeze that man up…" she said slowly.

"What about it?" asked Quel, now focusing on Saida and sitting down next to her.

"It was a Kidō spell, wasn't it?" she asked tentatively, with a look in her eyes that was impossible to fathom. All he could tell was that she was that she looked as nervous as he felt. Clearly, she understood the import of his use of Kidō.

"Yes," he said calmly, looking her straight in the eye. "It was Kidō."

"I thought only Soul Reapers could use Kidō?" She had accepted his answer easily enough, but would she accept his response?

"I'm not a Soul Reaper, but I do have their abilities," Quel shrugged. "I guess the only thing that separates me from them is that I don't uphold a Soul Reaper's duties, not all of them anyway. I do perform soul burials every now and again."

Saida had a faraway look on her face. Then she focused on him again and her expression was slightly stern. "You're leaving something out Quel. If you have the same abilities as a Soul Reaper then why are you in a physical body? Shouldn't you be incorporeal and invisible like a ghost?"

"Yeah, but this is where it gets confusing. I'm in my own body with Soul Reaper powers and the reason behind it is fascinating and none of your business at the moment." Quel gathered his wits and voiced his unspoken thoughts. "I'm curious about something too, though, Saida."

"What's that?" She looked like she knew what was coming. "How I even know about Soul Reapers?"

"Yeah, that," Quel said, showing his perplexity.

She smiled her trademark cute, seductive, gorgeous smile and her eyes twinkled mischievously as she said, "That is 'none of your business at the moment' Quel."

"I figured you'd say that," he replied resigned. A gust of wind tousled their hair as it abruptly sped through the arena, bringing with it the scent of the sea and the coolness of the open water. "Someday we will share this juicy stuff with one another…"

"But not today, eh?" she teased. Saida gracefully stretched once more and stood up to leave, looking down at him, mulling over something she wanted to tell him. "Don't always think of it as 'someday' Quel," she said solemnly. "Someday is also a code for _never_. Don't hesitate for what you want." And with that she was gone.

Leaving him to mull over what she had said. It was a shared belief in more ways than she knew. Her words echoed in his mind similarly to those spoken by someone long ago in Quel's past when he was far more naïve and blind to the ways of the world. This ugly yet beautiful world always had a surprise up its sleeve.

He was wide open for an attack. Hah-ha-ha-ha! It was impossible to assault him from the open air and this one knew it well. He knew you were there if the wind touched you or yours, but thankfully this one had learned a new way to camouflage his presence since they had last met. It would have to be done very carefully to be successful, but the soul cutter was so close he could feel its signature voice. Every weapon had a voice, some more so than others. This blade had a loud and deep voice, more so than its bearer used it for and that was a travesty. A travesty! A weapon was supposed to be used to its fullest potential! Well it was 'this one's' job to right this wrong, by any means necessary. Ha-ha-ha-ha-hah-ha-hah-ha-hah-ha!


	4. 3 The Thirty-Fingered Man

_**Chapter Three: The Thirty-Fingered Man**_

**Ivalice, Shetoshia, September 15th, 1391 a.c.**

The semi-finals of the tournament started normally. It was now down to Quel, Saida, Chuldo, the man who had held a rock as long as Quel, whose name was Jorgen, and four other shifty characters including one woman, two sword wielders and a misshapen man in a large cloak who hid his figure. Eight remained from what had once been over three-hundred and it was only day three. Currently Saida was on one end of the ring and Chuldo was on the other. They had somehow managed to meet up in the semi-finals and by the expressions on their faces they were both glad for it. Dong Dong was sitting next to Quel in the stands, both were watching the match start, occasionally visiting with each other as time passed by.

"My pa will beat yer friend mister." Dong Dong said matter-of-factly. "He's faced tougher foes than her before."

"I have no doubt he is strong, but I also know Saida is equally as strong if not stronger," Quel shrugged. "The match will end any debate soon enough."

"Yessir, it sure will," Dong Dong agreed. She swung her legs forwards and backwards through the air in front of her seat like any child her age would do. Her feet didn't quite reach the ground when she was in the stands anyway.

The referee announced Saida and Chuldo, listed the rules of the game and dashed out of the ring at full speed. Saida and Chuldo stood still as stone, regarding one another sternly. Then Chudlo ended the staring contest by charging straight at Saida screaming taunts. Saida calmly waited for him to arrive. When he got within striking range he let loose with a strong right jab at her midsection that Saida leapt over, landing on his extended arm as he retracted it. He swiped at her with his left arm and she jumped up even higher and did a diving kick straight at his head, which he ducked. Saida grabbed his ponytail as she fell and pulled him over backwards.

The impact was loud and raised a fair amount of dust as Chuldo slammed into the ground. Saida used this opportunity to leap up into the air and do another diving kick, this time with both feet. Chuldo, seeing her decent, used a last resort defense.

"INVINCIBLE STEEL ARMOR!" cried Chuldo, making spikes shoot out all over his armor. Each spike seemed to extend differently from its brethren but all of the spikes extended at least four feet out with the highest being five feet. His spiky armor literally raised Chuldo off of the ground. It lacked enough impetus to dig through the sun baked earth that was the arena floor. Saida was on a crash course for serious injury, or even death if she landed badly. Quel's heart raced in fear as adrenaline shot through his system. He could save her if he wanted to, but she would be disqualified and angry, very angry. This was her fight and he had best stay out of it.

His worries were needless as Saida had the situation well in hand. She saw the giant nasty spikes shoot out of Chuldo's armor right below her, their sharp points glinting wickedly in the sunlight. She had her own burst of adrenaline shoot through her lithe body and as she fell towards Chuldo she cocked both her arms backwards, bent her legs at the knee and punched both arms forwards, snapping her upper torso forwards.

Two powerful shock waves shot out of Saida's fists and slammed into Chuldo and his spiky armor. He was smashed into the ground, making a crater all around his form at least three feet deep, cracks spiraling outwards and dust rising up high into the sky. Saida was lifted by her own shock waves and used their updraft to throw herself to the side of Chuldo. She landed on the outside of the crater as the dust cloud formed a blanket over the arena, blocking vision of the battle for a few seconds. When the dust cleared it revealed Chuldo getting shakily up on his feet, coughing up a bit of blood and glaring at Saida out of his right eye, his left eye was swollen had retracted the spikes into his armor again otherwise he would still have been staked into the ground.

"Do you yield big guy?" Saida asked, smiling in a predatory fashion and breathing a bit faster than usual.

"N-never! It takes more than these flea bites t' fell me lass!" roared Chuldo, standing up to his full height and managing not to wobble at all.

The fight continued. Saida and Chuldo raced at each other and met in the center of the arena. Saida leaped up and was level with Chudlo's head as they met. She was tucked into a ball. Chuldo aimed a strong right hook at Saida's small form, planning on sending her flying out of the ring. Saida had no chance of dodging, nor did she intend to. As their collision was about to happen Saida snapped her legs out in front of her, planting a double kick on Chuldo's fist, breaking a few of his fingers. Chuldo let out a yowl of pain and anger and managed to hit Saida with a strong left hook, sending her flying through the air. Saida had blocked his fist with both of her forearms, but the blow still sent her flying to land near the edge of the arena's ring. She had the wind knocked out of her from both the force of his blow and her painful landing. The end of the arena was right behind her, her hair billowed in the breeze over the edge.

Chuldo rushed Saida, as was his custom, and Saida met him head on, which was her custom as well. This time they didn't break apart immediately. They exchanged blows with their fists and kept at it for over two full minutes; raining blows onto each other and grunting in pain whenever one manage to get past their guard to impact on their torsos or heads. Saida now had a cut lip and Chuldo had a lump over his right eye and he was bleeding from a cut over his left eye. Finally Chuldo picked Saida up and tossed her high into the air. Saida flipped at the top of her ascent and rapidly punched the air in Chuldo's direction as she descended, sending multiple shock waves out of her fists that smashed Chuldo into the ground and continued to slam him further down with every impact. She stopped and dropped the last few feet to the ground, rolling to lessen the impact. Chuldo was very still, immobile and seemingly unconscious.

Then he groaned and staggered up onto his knees and then, with heavily shaking limbs, he managed to stand back up. Saida was breathing heavily from the exertion, covered in sweat and he was breathing heavily from the punishment of it all, bleeding and sweating profusely. He was on his last legs and he knew it, but he would not yield. It was as admirable as it was foolish. Looking over at Dong Dong, Quel could see she was worried and doing her best to hide it. If he interfered they would both be disqualified, so Quel stayed put. Chuldo raised his head high and looked at Saida defiantly. She in turn stood to her full height and regarded him with equal defiance.

"I will retire for now lass," Chuldo said nonchalantly. "Chuldo, King of Destruction doesn't fight girls."

"Then what do you call what we've been doing for the past ten minutes?" asked Saida irately gesturing at the battlefield. "A lark!?" she yelled, furious.

"N-no, I was jus' exercisin' and now I can see you are no match for me, so I'm lettin' ye off the hook lass." Chuldo grinned arrogantly. "Bwa-ha-ha! Consider yerself saved lass!"

Chuldo, King of Destruction never saw Saida's fist coming due to the fact that he had his eyes closed as he laughed. When he awoke ten minutes later in the underground assembly area where all of the contestants had gathered in the beginning of the tournament he found only Dong Dong looking at him with a sad frown on her face.

"Arrrrgh, I underestimated that lass," Chuldo groaned. "She be a most dangerous foe."

Dong Dong shook her head wearily. "You were a bit too easy on her Chuldo," she said.

Chuldo couldn't argue with that, he had been off his game lately.

Back in the arena the semi-finals were coming to a close and it was Quel's turn to enter the ring. Saida gave him a half hearted grin as he stood up to leave for his match. He barely noticed the cut lip.

"Good luck Quel, I doubt you'll need it, but for some reason I feel like saying it."

"Thanks Saida. I can always accept good will from a girl like you." And then with a wink he was gone, reappearing at the edge of the arena, ready to go.

His opponent was a man wearing a cloak with his face hidden in the darkness of the hood. As Quel appeared he pulled back his hood to reveal a battered and scarred face that had seen many things, least among them peace. He unsheathed a short sword from his belt and snapped his left wrist, extending a long staff in that hand that was made out of some hard metal. Quel nodded his head in reflection. This looked to be an average fight, easily won if he played it safe. But Quel was tired of playing things safe, using his abilities to garner easy victories. This time he would play the way his opponent did and go for close quarters combat. Drawing his own cutlass from over his right shoulder, Quel did one practice swing before he charged his foe at a run. Quel's opponent responded by jogging forwards and positioning his staff behind his back, short sword extended forwards and down. It was a good position for countering.

A sudden movement at the edge of Quel's sight prompted him to halt his charge and see what the cause of the movement was. A misshapen man had clambered out onto the arena and was trying to walk forwards to where Quel and his opponent were fighting. Two security guards for the tournament were running out to stop the man from interrupting the match any more than he already had. Quel and his opponent regarded one another and nodded at each other, halting their advance. They had silently agreed to wait until this disturbance was handled before continuing their fight.

That was when everything fell apart.

The misshapen man struggled out of, in fact tearing to pieces, his large beat up cloak. Underneath it was revealed he had a gray complexion, red armor and six arms! A wave of disbelief and dread overcame Quel, making him almost fall over. The misshapen man drew forth six varied weapons and laughed all the while. He tossed two throwing stars at the security guards, aiming for their heads and killing them instantly.

"Ha-ha-ha! You can't forget me Quelly! I told you I'd find you." Grinning wildly, but not madly the misshapen man approached steadily.

"You're supposed to be dead Gilgamesh!" yelled Quel, anger and sorrow warring for control within him.

Quel's first opponent didn't understand what was happening in front of him and he also didn't care. He didn't last very long as he picked Gilgamesh as his first target and tried to stab him at close range with his short sword, but he didn't even get that far. He made it three steps before Gil's throwing stars took him in the chest, ending his fight. By now Quel and Gil were only separated by ten feet. Quel knew he had little choice. He had to bring out the big guns, his last resort weapon: his zanpakuto: Kaze no Koe. Quel reached over his left shoulder, drawing forth his zanpakuto and raising both swords for battle. Gil eyed this new weapon, undoubtedly remembering the last time he had fought it.

"That sword will be mine this time," Gilgamesh said. "And your head along with it!"

"Clichéd banter will kill me if your blades won't!" laughed Quel. "And for the last time, you can't use this sword even if you tried, moron!"

By now the crowd's anxiety was palpable and security guards could be heard racing towards the fight. Quel could see Saida standing and looking at him with both wariness and suspicion in her eyes. He couldn't focus on any of that now, Gilgamesh was one of the most dangerous and powerful enemies he had ever faced or heard of and he needed all of his concentration to stand a chance at surviving, let alone winning.

Gilgamesh raised his three swords up high and sliced downwards with them, two were wielded by his right arms and one was wielded by one of his left arms. Quel dodged to the side and blocked the three throwing stars that had been dirtily tossed at his torso when Gil had slashed downwards. All three throwing stars bounced off his cutlasses' hilt in quick succession. Now it was Quel's turn to strike and he wasted no time in using his zanpakuto. Raising it up over his head he slashed downwards and unleashed crescent wave of energy that shot out at Gilgamesh fast as a bullet, slamming into his upraised three swords. He managed to block the full force of the energy wave on his three swords, but he was still pushed backward four feet. Quel used the distraction to teleport behind Gil and slash at his exposed back, but Gil had anticipated that and had his naginata positioned to stab backwards. Quel had to fall over backwards instead and throw his left hand out to catch himself to avoid the vicious blow.

Gilgamesh jumped backwards, over Quel, spinning a mace on the end of a chain and throwing more throwing stars at Quel. Quel had to block all of the throwing stars with his zanpakuto and on his back no less. When he got back to his feet he had to immediately jump to his right as the mace came slamming down, creating a small crater and kicking up dust and debris. By then twenty-plus security guards had arrived, all with guns pointed at Quel and Gilgamesh.

Gilgamesh responded to the overt threat of the guards by stabbing two of his swords into the ground and forming a set of rapid hands sign with his now free appendages. Quel, knowing what was coming yelled a warning but was too late as Gil finished his hand signs and breathed a huge wall of fire that immolated all of the security guards, some of whom managed to get off a few panicked shots before being cooked alive in their armor. It was a deadly fire jutsu.

Gilgamesh was now involving passersby by in their fight and Quel would not stand that. Putting all of his rage and remorse over the needless deaths—even if they were hired thugs—he unleashed a devastating ability of his zanpakuto.

"_Okotte iru Tatsumaki!"_ yelled Quel at the top of his lungs as he raised his zanpakuto over his head and slashed it down and forwards, straight at Gilgamesh.

Gilgamesh looked back at Quel from his quick survey of the dying guards to see a giant tornado suddenly sprout into existence and race towards him, blotting out the sky and sucking up all loose debris. Everything weighing less than two tons got sucked into the tornado, such as bodies, rocks and other paraphernalia. Before Gil had time to move the tornado swept over him and sucked him up high into its midst, battering and beating him with the debris inside it and disorienting him as it spun him about faster than the eye could see. Gil's flames were snuffed out by the gale force winds as the tornado grew to encompass the center of the arena, deafening in its intensity and might.

Quel used the time he had bought to teleport back to Saida's side, appearing in front of her, making her jump in surprise.

"Are you coming with me?!" he yelled over the sound of the wind. He held out his hand to her as they were both buffeted by the winds.

Pausing only to think it over for a brief two seconds Saida nodded her head. "Yes!" she yelled back.

She grasped Quel's hand in her own and tried to smile, her hair got stuck in her right eye and before she could move it Quel had teleported them both back to his ship. Saida was a bit disoriented, this being her first time teleporting with Quel. It was an entirely different world from where they had been a second ago, though the tornado was still visible as a dark blotch in the distance. It was quiet and the sounds of normalcy echoed out of the city proper to this section of the aerodrome.

Quel was already walking towards his ship when Saida recovered.

"Wait a minute!" she said. "What was that back there?!"

"Later," he said over his shoulder, still walking. "As soon as we get somewhere safe I'll tell you what that was all about. But not until then, okay?"

"…Fine," Saida said quietly, eyes downcast. "I am mostly certain I want to hear what you have to say."

"That's a good thing, I think?"

"Yeah," she said following him. "I think you shady and naive, but I somehow feel like traveling with you anyway. Against all of my common sense."

"No, no," Quel said sarcastically. "Tell me how you really feel."

After they had taken off, bypassing air control and no doubt having a minor bounty placed on their heads, Quel put his ship on autopilot over the inland sea as they flew over it again, this time heading north northwest.

Quel turned and faced Saida. "What would you like to know first?"

She undid the ribbon holding her hair up and ran her hands through it, letting it hang around her shoulders. "How do you know that man?"

Quel looked out of the cockpit for a second, blocking out everything by looking at the sea and sky. Finally he turned back and regarded Saida carefully. "We used to be friends a long time ago."

Saida remained quiet, so Quel continued.

"I won't bother telling you the exact year and date, but I will tell you that I was the best of friends with Gilgamesh. We traveled all over the Circle together. That was back when his brother Enkidu was alive. We were quite the terrible trio." Quel smiled as he recalled long buried memories before a frown claimed his face and his brow furrowed in thought. His next words were soft enough that Saida had to strain a little to hear him. "It was very sudden, our falling out. We met a man by the name of Djkarta. He caused a rift to form between the two brothers and I. There was a terrible fight and in this fight Enkidu lost his life. Gilgamesh blames me for his death and I blame Djkarta. Gilgamesh doesn't see things that way, so he has pursued me for years, single-mindedly determined to kill me for a wrong I know I didn't commit."

Quel stopped and looked Saida in the eye, trying to evaluate what she thought of his tale.

She tilted her head coyly to one side, teasing him. "Is that all you have to say? Not how Enkidu died, or how Djkarta could destroy your friendship so easily?"

"Enkidu fell into the abyss that is at the center of the Core Islands." Quel said somberly. "Why was my friendship tarnished with Gil? He wanted two things I would never give him: my zanpakuto and the keys to pillage my family's graveyard."

Saida hadn't been expecting that answer. "Why would he want that?" she asked incredulously.

Quel shrugged. "Gil has always been a collector of rare swords and my zanpakuto, being the only zanpakuto that has a physical body besides its reitsu one, is a one of a kind blade. My family's graveyard is said to hold many powerful artifacts, but Gil didn't really want that, Djkarta did." Quel grimaced. "What Djkarta wanted, Gilgamesh supplied."

Saida remained silent for many minutes processing it all. Quel turned back to his controls, taking the ship off of autopilot.

"Not sure how I feel about telling you all of this..." Quel mused aloud.

"Why?" Saida asked. "Because you don't like being honest?"

"No," Quel said. "Because I don't like talking about my past, sordid details and all."

"This wasn't such a big eye opener Quel, get over yourself."

"Excuse me for being private woman," Quel said frowning. "You haven't been that honest with me and I hate giving away potentially dangerous information."

"How was it dangerous to share what you just did?" she said angrily. "What the hell do you think I'm going to do with it?"

"Nothing! But with most people this kind of information could get me into a world of trouble. You could sabotage my ship, poison me and call Gil to come finish me off, or something."

"Well aren't you a paranoid psycho," Saida was now incensed. "If you really think that little of me then I think I need to get off this ship."

"I don't!" Quel said loudly. "I just..."

"Just what?" Saida asked. "Are you afraid?"

"One step before that, actually." Quel said. "I'm in new territory sharing things like this with someone I've barely just met. It's going to take more time for me to feel comfortable around you Saida."

"Hell, I'd think you daft in the head if you weren't a little cautious," She hunkered down into her chair a little more. "Sorry," she said softly.

"No need to apologize. That was crazy back there. We just need to calm down and evaluate what we want to do next."

She didn't reply and a tense silence, the antithesis to the comfortable silence that had developed on their southern journey to Despian Isle, clogged the air. A lot of time passed, enough for her to think of and toss about numerous plans of action. Hours came and went like this and all the while Quel let her think. When he saw her shift in her seat as if to get up he knew it was time to settle things between them.

"I'll drop you off anywhere you want to go," he said into the silence.

Saida didn't respond, making Quel fidget slightly, wondering what she was thinking about. _Probably thinks I'm deceiving her somehow. Well I sorta am. I won't tell her about my family yet._

"I want to stay with you," she said quietly, making Quel turn to regard her in surprise. She was smiling, showing a bashful side to her personality Quel had heretofore not seen.

His mouth dropped open, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. He was completely caught off guard by her feelings for him. _Who knew she liked me that much!?_

Saida teasingly punched his right shoulder as she made her way to the small lounge. "Come on, don't be so surprised. You still owe me for ruining my chances at winning that tournament. I estimate that's about 10,000 in prize money. You've got a lot to make up to me"

Quel's mouth was now hanging open for a very different reason, smile effectively turned upside down. _From the warm tender heart of a woman to the cold clammy fingers of a miser. She just rocked my socks off and not in a good way!_


	5. 4 An Accord

_**Chapter Four: An Accord**_

**Radiata, Radiata City, September 19th, 1391 a.c.**

Quel stood at the southern gate of Radiata City, standing next to him was Saida. After fleeing the Tournament of Might and having their conversation aboard the _Nacht_ a new tentative bond of trust had formed between them. They were now joined in their ventures and had little, if any, distrust hanging between them.

They had come to Radiata to escape from Gilgamesh and because this was where Quel knew a good black market dealer who could smuggle them out of the area, hidden.

Quel and Saida each carried a satchel filled with the basic amenities that were necessary during their stay in Radiata City. Radiata was a world under the protection of the Developing Planets Act, which allowed no technology beyond what was already in existence on the world. Quel had given up his pistols and his beloved ship was not allowed to dock on the planet, but instead had been forced to dock at an orbital station.

Radiata was a world that was unique. Deep chasms divided the world, with there being few bridges spanning the great divides. Each section of land that was the giant puzzle of the world known as Radiata was called a region. All of these regions formed the world of Radiata. Though the bottom of the infinitely deep chasm was probably inane it was regarded with much superstition as no one dared explore down there. No one dared to and no one could, the technology was currently beyond what Radiata had. There simply just wasn't anyone insane enough to go down there without ample protection. For now, they would regard their world, with its myriad island land masses as the mystery it was, awaiting the day when they could plumb its depths for its secrets.

"So why are we here again?" Saida asked.

"Two things really," Quel said, "To get in touch with my contact in this city's thieves guild and to have some leisure time."

"So we're here for only one legitimate reason then," Saida stated.

"Yup," Quel replied, leading the way into the city.

Radiata City was an old city inhabited primarily by humans. It had four guilds: Theater Vancoor, the mercenary and warrior's guild of the city; the Olacion Order, the city's priest and religious guilds; the Vareth Institute, the guild of wizards and sorcerers in the city; and the Void Community, the guild of thieves and cutthroats. The Void Community was rumored to be in control of much of the goings on of Radiata City behind the scenes.

Over all of this loomed Radiata Castle, home of the Radiata Knights and the King of Radiata. The Knights govern and protect the kingdom with their Commander-in-Chief, who is also usually the Prime Minister of Radiata Kingdom, guiding and directing them. Radiata Kingdom has had wars with the wilder races and nations of the world, particularly the elves. Currently an age of peace exists between the humans and the fey, though it is a delicate peace. Bias runs deep in Radiata City.

Quel and Saida entered the city through Lupus Gate, which was the southern gate to Radiata City. They were in one of the four "towns" of Radiata City. There were four, the Yellow Town of Sun and Glory, the White Town of Stars and Faith, the Blue Town of Water and Wisdom and the Black Town of Night and Lust. Radiata was an old city and one Quel knew well with much fondness.

"Come on Saida, this way to a good inn I know."

The Swords and Silver Coins inn was located right beyond the Lupus Gate and was owned by a nice older woman with a penchant to read books as she sat at the front desk. She looked them over and gave them two rooms without a fuss before going back to reading again. Up the stairs to the right of the front desk they went to the second floor and found their rooms, located directly across from each other. After quickly checking out their rooms they departed the inn to explore the city. Quel showed Saida around for a bit, but they quickly went their separate ways. They promised to meet up again outside of the inn at sunset.

Quel took his time strolling through the city. He was slowly making his way towards one of the city's biggest structures: the Olacion Order Shrine. He intended to pray at the shrine, to dive into prayer as a calming boost to his mood. The shrine looked much as he remembered it: austere and warm. Children played in the square around the shrine, old man Godwin visiting with them and his caretaker assigned by the Order watching over him. She always had an expression of worry on her face because old man Godwin had the dexterity of a monkey: he seemed to teleport from one location in the city to another way far away from where he had been in an instant.

For now old man Godwin was playing with the children and Quel was entering a confessional that could only be accessed from the outside of the church. The shrine was odd like that. It had two confessionals that could only be accessed by non-clergy members from the outside. The better to run away I guess.

After praying Quel wanted to go and visit his friends in the Olacion Order, but all of his plans flew out of his head a moment later. As he was about to open the door to the confessional it flew open in front of him and a young girl, a rouge beauty, stepped out into the square and pushed past him on her way.

"Hey!" Quel called after her.

"Buzz off greenhorn, it's easy to get burned in this city," she said over her shoulder without stopping.

Quel was outraged. "You bumped into me! What the hell!?"

"No swearing in front of the children!" raged the old monk Godwin.

"Hell! Hell! Hell!" chorused the children.

Quel looked slightly sheepish as he turned back in time to see the girl vault and then leap over the fence to the city below. She had captivated his attention for only a brief moment, but now he was intrigued by her. The children were still chorusing their new word and Godwin was giving him an ugly glare, so he stepped into the confessional post haste.

Quel spent some time visiting with all of his friends in the Olacion Oder and he also introduced Saida to Achilles, one of the strongest warrior monks (if not THE) so that she could get some one on one training while they were here. Achilles was happy to train her. He had heard a great deal of the Ctarl Ctarl's immense strength and wanted to test his abilities. Quel didn't know whether to be concerned for Saida or Achilles. His final conclusion was that their heads were both so hard they would be fine, unconscious perhaps, but fine.

Quel crossed the city and journeyed into the belly of what was Radiata City's slum district, or the Black Town of Night and Lust. Deep within this shadowy district, down narrow streets, past dark doorways and down many stairways lay Club Vampire. The club was located at the bottom of a series of staircases in the deepest section of the slums, past barren streets that were more akin to alleyways than anything else. The buildings crowded together here, their roofs leaning together like men huddling together to whisper dark secrets.

Sinister was a good way to describe this place. The aesthetics alone would make anyone squeamish faint or run screaming into the night. Through all of this Quel strolled nonchalant. He acted like and in fact didn't have a care in the world. At the bottom of the many staircases he finally stood at the entrance to Club Vampire. The town was always perpetually in gloom in this, its deepest section. It looked and felt like it was one of the oldest areas of the city and it probably was.

A man was sleeping at the entrance of Club Vampire. His snores penetrating the silence and accompanied by the dripping of loose pipes, besides those sounds all was chillingly quiet. The man's head bobbed up and down with every inhale and exhale. He had a large afro, a charming well trimmed goatee and wore outlandish clothing: a high-collared white shirt and over that he wore a formal purple dining vest with gigot, or leg o' mutton sleeves puffing out; on his legs he wore purple pantaloons with white leggings; he had on three belts, two as small as to be inconsequential and one big one with a jewel set in the buckle; he also wore normal brown shoes and leather gauntlets. Needless to say he could have passed for some kind of flamboyant pirate, or a showman of some type. What he actually was, was the bouncer for Club Vampire, sleeping on the job.

Quel kicked him in the shin, jolting the man awake. "Oy, Pinky! Snap to!"

Pinky jolted awake almost violently and leaped to his feet, casting his gaze around in a panic until it rested on Quel.

"Huh? What!? Quel? Is that really you man?"

"Yes it's really me Pinky," Quel said smiling. "Is Ortoroz in?"

"Uh," Pinky said thinking. "Yeah he should be in back. Want me to tell him you're here?"

Walking past Pinky Quel said. "Come on Pinky, it's me remember? I'll go see him myself."

"Right. Oh, hey thanks for waking me up Quel!" Pinky shouted, then clamping his hands over his traitorous mouth in shock as he said out loud what he wasn't supposed to be doing.

"No prob Pink'," Quel whispered back before vanishing inside Club Vampire.

Club Vampire was a nightclub, so there weren't any people actually in the club aside from a few Void Community members at this time of day. Ortoroz, the leader of the Void Community's day-to-day activities, was resting in the back lounge of the Club. Ortoroz' one good eye opened when Quel entered the lounge and his weathered and dark features crinkled in a smile.

"Master Quel, it's been too long since we last had the pleasure of one of your visits!" Ortoroz said with joy. "What brings you to Radiata City my friend?"

"Trouble I'm afraid Ortoroz," Quel said. "It is good to see you again too."

Ortoroz was a man past his prime, but still possessing most of the vast strength and ability that had earned him a reputation of infamy in his youth. He had lost his right eye in a long ago battle and bore his wound with gentlemanly pride, wearing a gold patch over it. He had lost his hairline in a lifelong battle sometime after that and had a bald pate with semi-long grey hair growing along the back of his head. Ortoroz was a laid-back man with moments of true steel to his soul. He was jovial, courteous and he had an odd penchant to adopt young girls, his many "daughters" were all fine women he cared deeply for even if they weren't his blood children. He even lived with one of his daughters at the moment. The funniest thing about this powerful man was that he wasn't the true boss of the Void Community. He was what you would call the front stage boss and he reported to the back stage boss. He ran the daily operations of the Void Community and only a select few knew that he reported to anyone at all.

Quel was one of those few.

"Trouble Master Quel?" Ortoroz asked with a raised eyebrow and a smile. "You wouldn't want to see "_him"_ would you?"

"Actually, yes I would like to see him," Quel said hesitantly. "I need my back trail swept."

Ortoroz nodded his head judiciously. "Ok. You know the way. I know he'll want to see you anyway."

"Thank you Ortoroz," Quel said.

Quel exited the lounge and turned left and walked over to the gargoyle statue in the corner of the hall and kicked it, making a panel slide up into the ceiling in the wall next to the lounge door, revealing a hidden passageway. Passing through the hidden door Quel walked down a long hall and into a room lit by three blue fire torches in braziers. This was where Lord Nyx resided and the room was known as the Abyss. It had wooden walls and floor, statues and red curtains half hanging from the ceiling at the back of the room on either side of Lord Nyx himself.

Nyx was one of the oddest and most unique individuals Quel had ever encountered in his life and that was saying something. First of all Nyx did not simply stand, he floated. He was from a land far to the east of Radiata Kingdom and looked the part. He had white eyes lacking in any iris, with his eyes seeming to have an inner glow. His skin was a dark indigo blue. Exactly how he was able to float was a mystery. Was it because of some innate magic of his people, or had he learned some type of spell to keep himself aloft? Whatever the reason was he only floated because he had lost the lower half of his body in the long ago battle where Ortoroz had lost his right eye.

Now Nyx hovered because that was the only way he could get around expediently. Nyx wore a long black cape with the inside of it a brilliant red. This cape hung down past the remnants of his body. He wore a gentleman's coat in dark midnight blue with gold trim and the sleeves large and billowing due to his lack of arms. Nyx wore his stumped lower half wrapped tightly in cloth with a golden belt wrapped even more tightly around the cloth. Nyx gave off a macabre, yet daunting aura.

"Led here yet again boy?" Nyx said when he saw Quel. "I can only guess at what trouble you have gotten yourself into now."

"I guess I never come here just to visit, huh?" Quel replied in reflection. "Well I do need your help and I am willing to bargain for it."

"What do you need this time?" Nyx replied with a raised eyebrow.

"A back sweep of my trail and a false trail headed in another direction."

"That is within my ability to grant. Now how will you bargain for it?"

"Do you need a helping hand for a job at the moment, or would you rather I paid you for this favor?"

Nyx mulled this over for a few minutes then regarded Quel with his glowing eyes. "I think I have something you can do for me. It will be no easy task, I can assure you boy. Do you still want to do it?"

Quel nodded his head, eyes locked on Nyx's.

"Ortoroz will tell you what you must do. I will await your return. Good luck boy."

The job Nyx wanted Quel to do was anything but easy. Ortoroz was laughing till he was crying over how Quel had been hoodwinked into doing Nyx's "job" for him. Apparently all Nyx wanted was for Quel to harvest a rare plant in the Ocho region, which was a region known for its constant overcast of sinister clouds and echoes of thunder that ricocheted off of one's skull like a predators fearsome roar. The only other distinctive quality that the Ocho region had was if possible worse than the dark clouds and thunder: cyclones wandered across the region like animals themselves. Multiple small tornadoes were always active in that region and one usually had enough time to see them coming to run, but not always. Primordial monsters prowled through this inhospitable land with seeming ease. All in all it was not a pleasant place for the normal individual.

Quel took the vibe of the place in stride, doing his best to avoid the giant and terrifying beasts that resided in that region and keeping an eye and an ear out for the cyclones. He spent hours combing the ground for the plant he sought. Finally, after spending a full day searching, Quel gave up and sat on a boulder that protruded from the ground to eat the meal he had packed. He had a show to watch as he ate his meal: a pair of male smilodons were fighting for the privilege of mating with a female smilodon. Smilodons were basically the same as sabretooth tigers, only slightly bigger perhaps. The fight was quite intense and ended when the smaller (barely) of the two smilodon males gave up and ran away to live to fight another day.

Finished with his meal Quel jumped off of the boulder and began to trek back to Radiata City. That was when he spotted a small green goblin carrying a bundle in its arms. Focusing on the bundle Quel saw it was filled with various plants, including one of the rare ones he sought: the Queensfoil, a rare flowering plant Nyx desperately needed. Knowing better than to shout at the goblin, Quel took off at a run after him. He managed to catch up to the little fellow right as they reached the bridge out of the Ocho region and to the Adien region.

"Hey!" Quel called. "Hold up a minute!"

The goblin did anything but hold up. Now that he was aware of Quel he sped up and ran as fast as he could. Quel also increased his speed, keeping pace with the green goblin but he was unable to make up any ground to get closer to the fellow. So there they were, both of them running in the growing dark. Quel figured the green goblin was heading back to his village way over in the Dorse region. Shangri La was the only green goblin village Quel knew about after all.

When the green goblin vanished down a small tunnel in front of him that was along the side of the road Quel was quite shocked. The little guy didn't look like a dwarf, so where the heck was he going?

Quel dove in after the goblin, not pausing the check for booby traps and paying for his foolishness by tripping down a set of wooden stairs to crash hard against the ground in a lit tunnel that extended ahead of him into the gloom. He heard laughter from up ahead and knew the goblin had tricked him. Looking down he saw he had fallen on a banana peel. A banana peel!

Grumbling inwardly Quel took off at a run after the delinquent goblin. The tunnel extended for what seemed miles and Quel ran through its twisting turns after the goblin for what felt like hours. He could hear the patter of the little fellow's footsteps in front of him, just out of sight, so he never slacked in his pursuit.

Finally, after passing wooden support beams and metal lanterns for what seemed a lifetime Quel arrived at a nexus of tunnels where barrels, crates, picks and other dwarven mining equipment were stored. Standing in the middle of the nexus was the green goblin, breathing heavily and casting about for a tunnel to go through, he jumped when Quel arrived and chose one at random, dashing to the left. Quel hoped he had picked a dead end.

After another ten or so minutes of continued running Quel knew the goblin had picked another long tunnel. But this tunnel was different as it opened up into a vast underwater lake. Up ahead, about a hundred feet or so, was the green goblin.

"I just want to talk to you!" Quel yelled in frustration. "Wait up you little ingrate!"

"Never!" retorted the goblin. "You leave Ula alone!"

"I don't want to hurt you Ula!" Quel retorted. "I just want to see one of your herbs!"

"Me no have any erbs! Me have vegtabells!"

"Well can I see your vegtabells!?" Quel asked with some hope.

"No!" was the answer.

Hours later they had left behind the underground lake, left behind the tunnels and had exited in a forest region with the moon shining bright overhead. The chase continued for many hours. Quel was indefatigable, but Ula the green goblin was not. Ever so slowly she started to flag and eventually was only a few feet in front of Quel.

Finally, after spending half the night chasing this insane goblin, Quel was about to catch her. Reaching out to grab her he was knocked back by a giant form that swooped down and grabbed her from in front of him. Herbs went flying in every direction and Ula's cries of dismay were carried off into the night. Quel saw the Queensfoil and grabbed it, stuffing it down his shirt without pausing to think. Ula was being carried off by some giant bird. Quel couldn't leave things like that, so he took off on foot after Ula and her captor. His chase led to one of the chasms between regions and from there he spotted the giant bird dropping Ula off at its nest built in the cliff itself.

Quel had to store up his reitsu, his spiritual pressure, to use when he really needed it, but he had no choice but to use some of it now to help Ula. Drawing his zanpakuto from his back Quel called upon the forces of air and wind to launch him as if from a cannon, shooting across the vast abyss to smash into the bird's nest across the way. A raucous cawing ensued as the mother bird tried to peck him to death and he blocked all of her beak stabs on the flat of his blade. He was still smashed into the ground, but he was also alive.

Calling on his reitsu store again Quel used a sonido to teleport behind the mama bird's head where he slammed his zanpakuto's hilt into the side of her cranium with just enough force to knock her unconscious. The baby birds ran around in a panic within the nest. Quel ignored them. Grabbing Ula he teleported across the chasm back to where he had been standing on the opposite cliff edge.

Swooning from using so much reitsu Quel fell to his knees and did his best not to puke. Ula sat next to him in a daze. Physically she was fine, but mentally and emotionally she was probably in shock.

"Thank you," she finally whispered.

"No problem," Quel said after recovering enough to speak normally. "I hope you don't mind, but I'm taking this with me." He held up the Queensfoil for Ula to see. She nodded her head numbly.

"Ula doesn't mind," she said.

After that Quel helped the little green goblin back to her scattered greens and pack and bid her farewell.

Quel walked into Club Vampire later that same day at around 8 am. He had spent all day looking for the Queensfoil and he had spent all night chasing Ula only to then have to save her from being eaten by a strange giant bird. After that he had spent the remainder of the night walking back to Radiata City from the Nowem region, which was so far north he wondered how he had gotten there to begin with. Nyx was awake when he shambled into the back room and laughed when he saw how badly Que looked. Chasing a goblin around all night had earned Quel a smattering of dirt all over his body, rips in his clothing and some cuts on his face and arms.

"You seem to have been led on quite the adventure boy," Nyx remarked with amusement.

"Ugh," Quel replied, setting the Queensfoil down in front of Nyx. "Do we have an accord?"

"We do indeed." Nyx replied with more amusement growing in his voice. "Thank you for retrieving the Queensfoil, I can now take my baths again with my favorite shampoo."

Quel simply stared at him. "If it wasn't for how odd things turned out I'd say you had planned the whole damn night," he said quietly.

"It is said in the wild the Queensfoil attracts oddities like bees to honey," Nyx remarked as if to himself. "I hope your day wasn't too eventful boy?"

"Just as long as we have an accord I'm fine with whatever trickery you play on me," Quel said in irritation before shambling out of the room and back to the Swords and Silver Coins inn where he dearly needed a hot bath.


	6. 5 A Peaceful Interlude

_**Chapter Five: A Peaceful Interlude**_

**Radiata, Radiata City, September 20th, 1391 a.c.**

There was no kitchen in the Swords and Silver Coins inn, so Quel had to settle for eating at a local restaurant in the city for his breakfast. Ham, or its equivalent, and eggs broke his fast admirably. Saida had left him a note on his door telling him she was out training with Achilles "in extreme conditions" and that if he needed her to come looking in the Cuatour region where she and Achilles would be training.

After eating his breakfast Quel took a meandering route towards the city's northern gate, the Faucon Gate, which led to the Cuatour region. On his way there he saw the girl who had brushed past him at the confessional the day before. She saw him at the same moment and a small grin briefly appeared on her features.

"Still praying for your sins?" she asked sarcastically.

"Any sins I've committed I bear on my own," Quel replied, a mirthless smile appearing on his face. "Still being rude to random strangers?" he asked sarcastically.

She didn't respond, so he continued on his way. "Be good to others girly!" he said over his shoulder, waving.

Leaving the city behind he found himself surrounded by a peaceful breeze and a glorious day. The weather was enchanting in the Cuatour region and Quel basked in it as he walked along the dirt road looking for Saida and Achilles. Everything was flat, with wide open spaces all about him. He found them at the base of a giant old tree on the tallest hilltop in the area.

They were wailing away at each other with their fists and feet, blows connecting with loud slamming sounds. They'd have many bruises in the morning from such a frenzied sparring match. Each warrior acquitted themselves admirably, their prowess and abilities evenly matched with one another. It was with quite a shock that he noticed they had weights strapped to their arms, legs and torsos.

They noticed Quel as he got close and halted their match, the small cloud of dust billowing around them was carried away on the breeze.

"Hi Quel!" Saida called happily. "Achilles here is showing me some new defense forms I hadn't heard of!"

"That's good news!" Quel called back, now approaching within normal speaking distance. "How are you two doing?"

"Fine," Saida said, glowing.

"She is quite the fierce opponent," Achilles said in his deep voice. He was the strongest of the warrior monks the Olacion Order had to boast about, not that they boasted. He is a monkmaster, head priest of the Olacion Order and Kain, the High Priest of the Order's personal bodyguard. Achilles looks mean spirited and scary but he is in fact quite kind hearted and gentle. He has skin that looks light purple, no hair to speak of aside from his huge blonde eyebrows and blonde muttonchop sideburns. Achilles was training Saida in all that he knew, hopefully increasing her monk abilities in healing, combat and chi techniques.

"Well I just came to check on you two," Quel said, turning to go walk back to the city.

"Wait a minute," Saida said, making Quel turn to look at her. "Do you want to spar with us?"

"That is a wonderful idea," Achilles said.

"I don't have the energy to spar with you both at the moment. Can we think of something else?"

Achilles and Saida gave each other a look. "I suppose you could sit and watch us." Achilles said slowly.

"Yeah, I don't mind." Saida said.

So Quel sat there and watched as they pummeled each other. Saida and Achilles did acrobatic flourishes with some of their moves, but for the most part they simply whaled on one another. When not fighting they alternated by doing different types of strengthening exercises. Achilles tried to increase her jumping ability, only to discover she already could jump three times as high as he could. Then he tried to increase her kicking and punching strength, only to discover she was much stronger than he was. Scratching his head and unsure of how to help her, his previous training with her only involving forms and techniques, Achilles took a break from training her to ponder his next course of action. Finally Achilles began asking her how many types of chi offensive and defensive techniques she knew. By this time Quel had begun to drift off to sleep. Sensing it was time to go he stood up and stretched, waving to Saida and Achilles. They were so focused on their training that they barely acknowledged his farewell with one of their own.

Quel left them behind on that hilltop and walked back to the city. He didn't have anything to do, so he chose to wander around and have a look at the city. Radiata City was one of the only places he truly loved to be and he rarely got to visit it. He spent his time taking in the sights, sounds and smells of the city, wandering around with no purpose in mind.

Quel was snoozing in front of the fountain in Vancoor Square in the Yellow Town of Sun and Glory. He had come here only to sit and relax, but had fallen asleep from his mini ordeal the night before. Afternoon sunlight suffused his body with a comforting warmth. He awoke with a start to realize someone was sitting next to him. He was further startled to realize it was the same young girl who had been rude to him twice, first at the confessional then in town earlier today. She was looking at him intently, some emotion in her eyes.

"Hey, I heard about you from Orotoroz," she said.

"You know Ortoroz?" _Must be a Void member._

"Yeah, he's my boss," the girl stated.

"Ok, what do you want?" Quel asked her.

"I want to know more about you," she said. "Do you really have your own ship?"

"Yes I do," Quel said.

"Have you really traveled around the entire Circle?"

"Most of it anyway," he replied yawning.

"Are you always this honest?" she asked suspicious of him.

"Only when I'm talking to attractive women," Quel replied with another bleary eyed yawn. "Are you always this arrogant?"

"Only when I'm around irritating outlanders," she countered.

"I'm not a newcomer to Radiata."

"Well you're all the same, coming here and messing things up before you move on," she seemed inordinately peeved.

"You have any more questions you want to ask me?" he asked in exasperation.

"Yes," she said pensively. "When are you leaving?"

"Tomorrow or the day after maybe, why?"

The girl didn't reply and she furrowed her brow at him before walking away without saying another word.

"You're welcome kid!" he yelled after her retreating figure.

Quel watched her go then stretched and walked back to his inn. He found Saida resting in her room snoozing and left her there undisturbed. So much training had taken a toll on her body, even if she was an almighty Ctarl Ctarl. He went and took another small nap in his room. Later on after he had eaten dinner he found Saida sitting out in the street looking up at the castle. The sun had long since set and a chill was growing in the night air.

"It's a beautiful piece of architecture isn't it?" he remarked as he sat next to her.

"Yeah…" she said dreamily. "The Ctarl Ctarl's would make something ten times as big and give it a goddy façade."

Quel didn't know how to respond to that, so he changed the subject after a few seconds worth of silence passed.

"How is your training going?" he asked.

"It's over," she said offhandedly. "Achilles taught me all he could."

"Ah, that's too bad."

Saida turned and smiled at him. "Thanks for introducing me to Achilles."

Quel gave her a smile of his own. _We smile a lot at each other, don't we?_ "Not a problem Saida, I was happy to introduce you to each other."

"It definitely paid off," she remarked flexing her left fist. "I have some ideas for a new technique that I'll need to hammer out."

"Cool," Quel said letting the conversation drift off into silence as they both gazed at the stars.

"Do you want to come with me tomorrow to pray at the shrine?" he asked.

"Sure," Saida replied. "A monk has to remain centered and prayer does center oneself."

"I see, well it will be good to have you along."

Saida blinked in surprise at this. "Why will it be good to have me along?" she asked coyly.

"Uh, because I like spending time with you?" Quel replied slowly.

"Oh," Saida said.

"Is that a bad thing?" Quel asked in surprise.

"Not at all," Saida said softly.

Quel looked over to notice she was smiling to herself. This time the smile was different from all of the others. He chose to remain quiet and sit with her in the cool night air gazing at the heavens. The moment was too delicate to break, under the pearly light of the waning moon and the thousand glittering of the uncountable stars. The sounds of the city echoed around them, faintly all about. Not long after that they both went to bed, bidding each other a good night and retreating into the solidarity of their sleeping minds.


	7. 6 The Trigger

_**Chapter Six: The Trigger**_

**Toril, the Moonwood, June 20th, 1391 a.c.**

Moonlight shone down on a rare festival occurring within the Moonwood. It was the Summer solstice and it was also a brilliant full moon. There hadn't been a night like this in decades. Moon elves danced under the luminous sky. One of the many festivities that occurred in the Moonwood that night took place on a treeless hill known as the Mouth of Song, where many moon elves and dark elves communed with the moon together. This contrasting and paradoxical festival was possible because these dark elves were followers of Eilistraee, the one good drow goddess who gathered to her bosom any dark elf who chose goodness and light over darkness and wickedness.

It was a festival of boisterous singing, fair maidens dancing and enchanting firelight casting mysterious shadows on the revelers. There were many secluded celebrations taking place in the woods on that night, but the one that occurred on the Mouth of Song would forever be remembered in a different light.

Those who were in the know would remember this as the event that triggered the madness. It all started here, on this seemingly peaceful night.

He stood amid the shadows of the wood, part of them yet undeniably separate. He was too dark to completely blend in with the shadows. He crouched out in the dark, beyond the protection of the festival lights. His eyes glinted keenly with a malevolent inner will. He was Dusk, a psiforged stalking prey who didn't even know he existed, but soon would to their eternal dismay, short lived though it be.

He was a robotic warrior given life by the Cannith forges and imbued with the power of psionics. He was far more than he appeared to be. Few were those who knew his name and fewer still who could speak it without fear. He, of course, had no allies, only momentary partners foolish enough to work with him.

He had an insatiable hunger for destruction and unfortunately for others he was very good at destroying things.

His name was Dusk for a specific reason: his metal skin was dark as pitch. Charcoal grey like industrial smokestacks was his main coloration and he had undertones of copper shot through his frame, giving him the look of a being formed of the last vestiges of sunset in the right light. His body had an iridescent inner glow that cast no real light, but gave him a unique and not quickly forgotten appearance that he both enjoyed and disliked. Enjoyed for the impression he left in people and disliked for the uniqueness of it, easily remembered and tracked ass he was. Two colors of crystal adorned his body, dark purple crystals the shade of dark eco and dark black crystals like some essence of pure shadow. These also glowed with an inner light that cast some light waves, but he could suppress these into darkness with a thought.

He was a master at stealth and assassinations were his trade. His reputation in the underworld of crime was small, but spoke for itself to any who heard of him. Aside from his psionic abilities and his martial prowess with blades he had other abilities he kept hidden lest his secrets be revealed.

With Dusk on this night were his two most recent "fleshie" partners, both of whom he was actually beginning to consider above worthless. His two allies were experts in their respective fields. One was a necromancer and the other was a summoner of astonishing skill. Each could lay waste to a small country if they had the desire, but together they had just enough power and ability to serve the purpose Dusk had in mind for them.

Tonight they were ordered to hang back and watch. They must behold Dusk's might with their own eyes so that they would know without a shadow of a doubt what happened to those who betrayed him or stood in his way.

At the top of the Mouth of Song stood a young elf priestess, barely ten years old and precocious as was her age, she was busy whistling with a piece of grass. She was playing such a nice little ditty that her father didn't want to disturb her, but eventually after letting her go through two repetitions of the song he cleared his throat and called her name.

"Elaya," said Mortius. "It's time my dear."

Turning the girl gave her father the biggest grin. "Ok Papa!" she said breathlessly, filled with excitement at her first chance to participate in the solstice ritual. She was dressed in a flowing white gown and wore a crown of freshly picked flowers in her hair. Her green eyes, so like her mother's, shined with pleasure and happiness. Mortius was a prime example of a dark elf turned to the light of his goddess Eilistraee and his obsidian skin, pale white hair and red eyes set him apart from all other surface elves.

Shanidrey, Mortius' wife and Elaya's mother was a moon elf of surpassing beauty. With pale skin like pearls, hair so black it shined blue and green eyes flecked through with gold dust: Shanidrey was heart wrenchingly beautiful. Mortius did suffer persecution for his presence in the Moonwood, but his marriage to Shanidrey had mostly quieted down such bias and persecution. Elaya was the wood's shining guidepost to a better tomorrow.

Shanidrey led the procession up the hill, her daughter right beside her all the way. Mortius watched with a smile from the bottom of the Mouth of Song as his family ascended to the top of the hill.

"I have been told you are the keeper of a way into the Gates of the Moon," A voice whispered at Mortius' back.

A million thoughts shot through his mind, but he was foremost concerned for his family. His eyes darted up to them, his concern very apparent. He dared not turn to see who was behind him.

"What do you want?" Mortius asked in anger.

"The key to the Gates of the Moon," said the voice. "Do not test me."

A sharp pain pierced Mortius' back and he gasped in shock and agony, but knew better than to cry out. He felt a warm liquid flowing down his back and knew it for what it was: his blood.

"Quickly tell me the way to the Gates of the Moon, or I will kill everyone here."

The voice held no threats, only promises. Whoever this was they were dead serious. Mortius could tell that much.

"The key to the Gates of the Moon is in the cellar under my house. You will find it within the chest under the stairs. The key allows you access to a portal hidden on the eastern edge of the Moon Pass." Mortius gathered his breath and resolve. "The password is 'under the light of the moon.'"

There was a pause before Mortius felt the knife at his back vanish and he breathed a sigh of relief only to feel a terrible pain on the back of his head. He fell limp and lifeless to the ground. Up on the hill Elaya and Shanidrey commenced with the ritual, secure in their belief that Mortius was watching them. He may well have been, but not from anywhere they could see him. Dusk, his dark deed complete, retreated back into the shadow of the wood.

If the elves discovered Mortius' corpse before he had a chance to get away he'd have to deal with them. He couldn't use magic without some sort of covering spell because if they had someone skilled enough to detect his spells he could be tracked that way. Thankfully he had brought along a summoner who could provide a covering spell for their getaway. Not to mention a big enough distraction to confuse their pursuers, if there ever would be any.

Dusk nodded at his companions and they gathered together, the summoner doing his incantations, summoning forth who knew what. When the incantation was done the summoner nodded to his two companions and they vanished with a mass teleportation spell. A light appeared in the sky over the Mouth of Song. Everyone turned to look at it and happy faces soon became confused, then afraid. It was not the glow of stars or moon. It was a fiery orange color, the color of flame. It grew from one big light to many small lights, shooting down wrathfully from the heavens.

Within minutes the whole forest around the Mouth of Song experienced a rain of stone and fire as many small meteors impacted on the land, catching a huge swath of the forest on fire and destroying the sanctity of the ritual irreversibly. Death rained down, killing many in a massacre that would not be long forgotten. The fires ravaged the wood for over a day and were only put out by the concentrated efforts of many moon elves. Mortius' body was discovered later on and initially they thought he had died in the barrage, but a healer examined him more closely and determined he had been murdered prior to the rain of fire. His family grieved for him and gave him a proper burial.

The elves grieved, but they also knew something was perilously wrong. Their goddess was in danger. Five days later after the night of death the moon began to cast an evil glow on the world and the Moonwood elves knew something terrible had happened to their goddess and to the world.

Dusk stood overlooking the golden towers of Huzuz, the City of Splendors. His brokers had known better than to betray him and he was expecting a delivery within the next two weeks that would get him one step closer to his goal. The cold night wind made his black tattered cloak billow around his form, but the coldness couldn't reach Dusk. He was immune to such things. He stood there, looking out at the hapless and clueless masses going about their daily lives. Ignorant fools, all of them. Soon he would have what he wanted, thanks to the infliction of a curse on a few paltry worlds, but he would still have it. At that moment Dusk couldn't see an obstacle barring his plans from bearing fruit and that made him examine his plans from every detail. Sometimes it was dangerous when no problems were apparent.

He would have to come up with countermeasures in case anything or anyone tried to stop him, unlikely as that seemed. Wild cards were not unheard of and were usually all it took to unravel the best laid of plans. First he would talk with the Grand Caliph, or more likely his puppet would, and then he would set traps along his safe routes. He had much to still do.


	8. 7 Mission From the Gods

_**Chapter Seven: Mission From the Gods**_

**Radiata, Radiata City, September 24th, 1391 a.c.**

Standing under the bright and beautiful sun it was hard for Quel to focus on what had just happened. Hard to believe a goddess in physical form had just come seeking his aid, hard to believe that she had almost begged him. A small part of his brain, the one that had a hard time not being a cynic, was laughing, telling him he was probably more astounded by the fact that Saida had gotten irate at the goddess, defending her territory, as it were, over Quel. It was hard to question the guts, and stupidity, it took for a mortal, even if she was half Ctarl Ctarl, to stand up to a goddess. Quel let his mind take him back to the past few hours, living again a scant few moments that would determine the course of his life for years to come.

They had been praying in the church of Olacion, Saida and he. Quel had been having this nagging feeling that _something_ was out of place, but he couldn't figure out what it was. He was left feeling anxious all morning. He would soon have his answer, from an unexpected place. The pious silence was broken by no sound, or impulse. Her arrival was as unobtrusive and silent as could be. Only her scent, that of flowers and the unmistakable aroma of power that a god, or goddess, exuded announced her presence. Turning to look back over his shoulder Quel saw Sharess, a goddess of Toril clad in mortal flesh, standing with one hand cocked on her hip and her head tilted quizzically to the side, studying him.

With a start he realized who she was. "Sharess!?"

"It has been a while Quelly," she said seductively. "I have so missed you."

"Who's this woman!?" asked Saida immediately hostile.

"The goddess Sharess," Quel said. "She is the lady of revels and other pursuits of pleasure."

Sharess winked at Saida. "Don't worry, I won't take your lover away."

Both Saida and Quel blushed at that and looked away from each other. Saida recovered quickly and grew upset. "W-we aren't lovers!" she said angrily.

Sharess put one finger up to her lips in thought, open astonishment plain on her face. "Oh…? Well then I can borrow Quelly for a few hours then…?"

"Absolutely not!" Saida said loudly.

Sharess smiled wickedly. "Why not…?"

"B-because! He's not interested in a woman like you!"

"How _do_ you know?" Sharess teased.

Saida began to blush and she was trying her best to remain calm, but Sharess was pushing her.

Quel, growing increasingly uncomfortable by all of this, interrupted them. "Why are you here Lady Sharess?"

Sharess smiled gorgeously, looking Quel in the eye knowingly. "I have come specifically to see you Quelly."

Saida's ears twitched atop her head, though she refrained from saying anything.

Sharess cast Saida an annoyed look. "Now I think it's time for you to leave mongrel."

Quel opened his mouth to stop what he knew was about to explode, but was too late.

"Mongrel!?" Saida said outraged. "Take that back you hag!"

Sharess' left eye twitched ever so slightly. "As your goddess I advise you to not insult me and to stop interrupting."

"You're not my goddess!" Saida bellowed in denial, standing up. "And you instigated all of this!"

"She is a goddess with affinity to you Saida," Quel said quietly.

Saida turned and glared at Quel. "Who's side are you on? What do you mean by that?"

"Oh he's just trying to tell you I'm the Mother of Cats," Sharess winked. "That's one of my titles."

"Alright!" Quel yelled, before any other arguing could begin. "Leave her alone! Why are you here Lady Sharess?"

Now it was an uncommon thing for a deity, even a demigod, to show any emotion or attitude that could be interpreted as a weakness. Which was why when Sharess looked forlorn a moment later Quel felt an ominous foreboding creep up his spine. Saida sighed in anger and sat down on one of the pews to listen.

"Quelly…" Sharess began tentatively. "We need your help. You're the only one they will all pretend to trust enough to do this."

"Tell me what's happened," Quel seated himself next to Saida. "It's not like a goddess to show emotion."

Sharess smiled a sad little smile. "No, I suppose it isn't. Well goddesses aren't supposed to be able to be kidnapped by mortals either."

Quel wasn't so sure he had heard that one correctly. "Huh?" he said intelligently.

Sharess dabbed at her now misty eyes with her sleeve, a very unladylike and even more undeitylike thing to do. She collected herself and seemed to be thinking of the best way to frame her thoughts.

"Quel…" she began slowly, looking from Quel and then to Saida. "And…you, cat-girl, we stand on the edge of an abyss. If we falter for even a moment, all will fall to ruin and chaos. Selûne and Eilistraee have been kidnapped. We know this because there were many witnesses. It is incomprehensible for even a single goddess to be kidnapped, let alone two," she paused there, gathering her willpower to continue. "The sudden disappearances of Selûne and Eilistraee has cast their worshippers into a state of chaos, but that is the smallest consequence. Shar is on the move and all who are allied with her are marshaling their forces to join her cause. If Selûne is not brought back to counter her sister's dark power the realms will be cast into eternal darkness. What's more, because of the disappearance of Selûne the moon has been afflicted with a horrible curse. It shines black upon the world, casting an unholy and corrupted light. And it gets even better. Azeroth has lost their goddess of the moon, Elune, as well." She paused to let it all sink in. Quel let about a minute pass and then he stiffly nodded for Sharess to continue.

"Now I will tell you about the one responsible for both of these sins, for it was one creature who did these deeds. Multiple witnesses have told us it was a single warforged, wearing a black cloak and being constructed of blackened adamantine. He didn't overpower them, nor did he cast a spell that could entrap them. All reports claim he had in his possession an artifact of strange design that drained the goddesses of their power, bound them in mortal coil and trapped them within the device before vanishing through a portal he created." Sharess hissed in anger, much like a cat, making Saida's ears and posture perk up. "Whoever he was he had been planning this blasphemous assault for years! All of the gods have been divided in our response, but I and a few others managed to convince some of them to allow you to search for us without us getting in your way. Before you ask, no we cannot do anything to this warforged, he not only vanished without a trace he also is powerful enough that we cannot send enough of our servants to deal with him without making the other gods and goddesses notice. Shar will stop at nothing to prevent her sister's return. If we dedicated ourselves to his ruin we would drag the other members of the pantheon into war. This is why we cannot interfere. That is all I can tell you…"

Sharess shifted position from one leg to another in the ensuing silence. She hadn't left her position by the entrance to the church. It was late in the day, evening actually, and thankfully no one was nearby to disturb them as they talked.

"Ok," Quel said after thinking it all over. Both women turned to look at him. "So you want me to go looking for this warforged and retrieve the three goddesses he has kidnapped. What if I can't find him and what if when we do get the goddesses back we can't turn them back to normal?"

Sharess waved away his concerns, literally waving her left hand and shaking her head. "You leave that to us. Just focus on getting those goddesses back."

Quel sighed, and Saida giggled.

"You know," she said to Sharess. "I think I might actually like you."

Sharess smiled a sudden weariness visible on her. "I have to go now, things are becoming too dangerous for me to be away for long," she turned to go then paused, turning to give Quel and Saida one last look. "If you cannot do this thing there will be a war of the gods. I cannot promise you a reward, but I can promise you we will give to you what little remains of _Them_ in our possession."

Quel perked up at this. "You mean a Regalia?" he asked in wonder, too amazed to guard his reactions.

Sharess shrugged, turning to leave. "We do not rightly know. It is just something we have had in our possession now for a few millennia. You will have to find out for yourself."

"Saida! Shield your eyes!" Quel said urgently. Saida obeyed without thinking and from behind her hand she saw the light as if from a sun, shining through and casting the innards of her hand in sharp relief. Sharess, like all godkind, had cast off her mortal form in a display of godly power, transcending up into the heavens. She left behind no trace of herself, but Quel could have sworn he heard her voice whisper to him as she left, echoing enchantingly in his mind.

_Go to the Elfsong Tavern,_ she said. _You will find your way from there._

The lighting was dim in Club Vampire. The Club had a fully stocked bar with an attractive bartender. She was one of Ortoroz's many adopted daughters. The old man adopted daughters like most people bought pets. While he may have had more children than most his devotion and kindness to every one of his daughters was well known. Ortoroz sat across from Quel, leaning against a poker table, sipping a brandy in one hand and hugging Silvia, the adopted daughter he was currently living with, with his other arm. Quel and Saida were currently having a discussion about the earlier events of the day, one event in particular.

"I still don't buy what you're telling me," Saida said in disbelief. "She seemed completely normal to be a god."

"Yeah, well she did disappear in a blaze of light for being normal," Quel replied.

"True," Saida admitted. "I just find it hard to believe is all."

"It is so rare to see a god that I'm not surprised by that."

"Not too rare," Saida said teasingly. "She knows you by first name _Quel_."

"Yes, well," Quel said uncomfortably, Ortoroz and Silvia looking on with sympathetic smiles. "That was from the one time in the past I've helped her kind."

"Only once?" Saida pressed, smirking ever so slightly.

"Yes," Quel said before changing the subject abruptly. "You have no idea how lucky you are to have seen her. Everyone you will ever meet and their children and their grandchildren and everyone they all will ever meet will never encounter one of her kind."

Saida stayed very quiet, digesting his words.

"So that big of a mucky muck flirted with you?" she said after a while. "You must know how to show a girl a good time then." She winked.

Quel smiled. "I think so. Sometimes anyway."

A silence settled in the bar, washing over everything slowly.

"So you leave in the morning, eh Master Quel?" Ortoroz asked, breaking the silence.

"Before full light," replied Quel, thankful for the change in subject. Ortoroz gave him a knowing wink with his one good eye.

It was just Quel, Ortoroz, Saida and Silvia. The Club was empty of anyone else and it was oddly still for this time of night, it was after all only nine o'clock at night.

Silvia yawned expansively and Ortoroz launched into another topic.

"Why such a sudden change of plans Master Quel?" he asked. "We expected to have you for at least another three days. You are putting Lord Nyx in a bit of a jam, it's not like you."

Quel shrugged, slightly embarrassed and slightly agreeing with Ortoroz. "An emergency request from a friend is my excuse Ortoroz."

The old man nodded at this, a twinkle suddenly appearing in his eye. "Well now just remember you owe us for once! Hahahaha!"

Saida rolled her eyes and smiled at Quel and he smiled back. Ortoroz was a harmless man overall. He was more of a doting father than a crime lord, though he had his criminal moments. Quel had just never gotten on his bad side and he had planned it that way. Just then a young girl walked into the room, she was breathing heavily as if she had run all the way here. She immediately caught everyone's attention, which made her shrink back a little. Then, marshaling herself, the girl strode boldly into the casino proper and stood right in front of Quel.

Looking up he realized with equal parts curiosity and dread that it was the girl he had interacted with earlier. The one who had brushed past him at the confessional, been rude to him multiple times and had questioned him.

"Take me with you," she said. Her voice was filled with a powerful emotion. He paused to better judge for himself what was unfolding before him. Quel could easily see some deep emotion gripped her soul, her body trembled very subtly and her eyes were unwavering.

"I cannot," he replied simply.

"Why not!?" she retorted, pointing at Saida, "If you can take that girl, then why not me?"

Saida snorted, causing the girl to give her a dirty look. Quel shook his head. "If I were to take you, you would probably die. What we are about to attempt is for the insane or the cursed."

Saida glanced at him sidelong over that.

"What do I have to do to prove myself to you?" the girl pressed.

Quel was at a loss as to what to do. He looked over at Ortoroz and gave him a helpless look. Ortoroz, curse him, smirked.

"You will not deter her this time I think, my friend Quel." Ortoroz said. "This girl is in search of her parents. She was given to the Order as a newborn. She has no memories them, so she will never let go of this chance to go and find them."

Quel sighed and looked the girl in the eyes. "What makes you think your parents aren't on Radiata?" he asked.

She didn't even hesitate. "I've been searching for them for two years straight, they're not here. You're the only one who has landed on this world who has any contact with the Void Community. You are also a man who looks reliable (Saida had a coughing fit when she heard this. Quel ignored her.). I'm going with you whether you want me to or not."

"Let her come," Saida said suddenly.

Aghast, Quel looked over at his companion. "What for?"

"You already know why," Saida said, rising from her seat and leaving the room.

Quel sighed and stood up to look the newest member of his crew in the eye. She was beaming in an unseemly fashion. Girl figured she had him pinned, she was right of course, but he wasn't going to give her complete satisfaction.

"You disobey my orders or become a hindrance and I'll send you back to the Void Community faster than you can say 'cap'n cap'n', got me?"

"Yes sir!" she beamed, "Thank you sir!"

Quel was having a hard time deciding whether to grunt in agreement or just sigh in exasperation again.

"What's your name?" he asked instead.

"Flau," she said, a regular smile now on her face instead of a radiant one.

Knowing better than to ask if she had a surname, Quel simply nodded and snarled at her to be ready to leave "before the gods themselves were awake!" She took his minor display of tyranny in stride and raced off to do some final preparations of her own. Quel bid Ortoroz and Silvia a good night and went back to his room at the inn, thoroughly exhausted.

The three of them stood at the southern gate of Radiata City. Ortoroz stood a short distance away. With him was Eon, a member of the Void Community. Both of them had come to see the three of them off. Flau, dressed in her short shorts, shirt, vest, gloves and long boots. Quel, dressed in his cloth shirt, collar unbuttoned, vest worn over the top of the shirt; metal gloves protecting his hands, metal leg armor worn over brown leather pants and soft leather boots completed his outfit. Saida had her forearms wrapped tightly in cloth, with leather fingerless gloves. She wore a sleeveless short top that only covered her upper torso, leaving her stomach and chiseled six-pack exposed to the elements. She wore a belt securing her mini-skirt and her shins wrapped tightly like her forearms. To finish off her outfit she wore moccasin shoes. Saida also had painted her face today with two double sets of stripes of white war paint running under her eyes and a large circle painted on her forehead. She had her hair braided intricately and seemingly randomly as well, with half of it being braided and half unbraided. In a word, she was wild.

All three were ready to set out. Their farewells were sparse, for they had already had long goodbyes earlier. Rynka, a dark skinned violet haired woman of no small beauty, watched Flau with sadness and joy mixed in her eyes. Rynka was the one whom Flau had trusted most in the Void Community and was like her elder sister and mother in many ways. She waved as the three of them were picked up by the courier ship from the orbital station. The peaceful interlude at Radiata was over and now with the false cover Nyx had given them and their backtrail having been swept by Nyx's contact, they were ready to set off without fear of being pursued.


	9. 8 Venom, Ferocity and Madness

_**Chapter Eight: Venom, Ferocity and Madness**_

**Toril, Baldur's Gate, September 26th, 1391 a.c.**

It was a stormy night, full of the wrath of thunder and rain. The Elfsong Tavern was a place many were seeking shelter in, Quel, Flau and Saida among the multitudes. Like most taverns in this part of the world a motley assortment of adventurers sat at the bar and around the many tables. The main door opened up onto a common room that ran across the entire front wall of the building. From the door you could see far over on the right-hand wall a juvenile, yet still fearsome, beholder head mounted up above the fireplace. Tables lined the front of the room, space left only for the front door. The bar was directly across from the main doorway and back and to the left of it was the entrance to the cellar, which supposedly had its own entrance to the sewers underneath the city. A staircase was to the left of the front door and it led up to the tavern's rooms. The tavern was still possessed of its same magical nature: the voice of an elven woman sang the beautiful and sorrowful song for her long lost lover at sea. To those not prepared for the ghostly song it was quite a shock to hear such a beautiful voice seemingly echoing from the very air itself, never too loud, never too soft. Most were silent, basking in the ghostly enchantment of the elven song with the rain pounding against the roof of the tavern as backup.

Flau was teary eyed a bit from the beauty of the song. Saida was twitching her ears every once in awhile, focusing on the voice. Her expression was one of tired repose, the unique kind a predator could exhibit with half-lidded, yet piercing eyes. Quel was enjoying himself as he both listened to the song and looked for the person Sharess had sent him here to find. He had absolutely no idea who to look for and enjoyed that crucial factoid. All three of them had mugs full of ale. Quel wouldn't drink the stuff, so he had given his to Saida, she had long since drained both mugs and was enjoying a light buzz. Flau was sipping her ale distastefully, with Saida seeming to inch closer and closer to Flau's mug every passing minute.

Finally Quel couldn't take the waiting any longer, so he went up to the bar to see what he could find out. On his way he stumbled into a man who smelled of sand, spice and an ocean full of strong drink. This man covered himself in the garb of a desert wayfarer. Wearing a cloak and hood such as he did in Baldur's Gate wasn't enough to attract attention normally, but he did catch Quel's eye.

The man cursed at Quel vehemently in his language. Saida looked on with interest and Flau was still lost in the music. An old man chose that moment to plunk himself down in Quel's vacated seat. Saida and Flau regarded him curiously. He raised his right hand in a shushing gesture and pointed at Quel and the other man with one palsied hand.

Quel slapped away the man's accusing hands, which had been in his face, and stood his ground. "Look buddy. Don't pick a fight with me over nothing. Why are you so paranoid, huh?"

The other man seemed to understand him and he grew even more intolerable after Quel had said this. He drew forth his sword in a grand flurry, showing off. Apparently he either didn't notice or didn't care that Quel was equipped with two swords on his back. Quel had to give up his pistols whenever he came to a planet like this one. A planet that sanctioned the Developing Planets Act, which stated that any technology that was possessed of qualities more advanced than the world's given level of technology were prohibited from being allowed onto the planet.

Quel, seeing a sword now pointed in his face, didn't budge. Everyone that had been near him and his blustering opponent had backed away a good six feet, leaving a ring of men watching the budding fight. Quel yawned in the face of his opponent, who was jabbing the sword at Quel. This outraged his opponent who yelled a war cry and attempted to lop off Quel's head. Quel simply ducked, took a quick step forward and slammed his left palm up under the man's jaw. The man's head snapped back and he went over like a bag of potatoes.

There were a few ragged cheers and insults thrown Quel's way. He just bowed formally and picked up his assailant by the armpits, dragged him over to their table and plunking him down in the chair Saida had just grabbed from another table. Seeing the old man and noticing his garb Quel smiled. "You're from the Unapproachable East, aren't you?" he said.

The old man bowed his head slightly, looking over the unconscious man at their table. "And he is from Zakhara. Forgive my intrusion, but it pains me to see two young women left unattended for even a second."

Quel glanced at his two companions. "What are you doing in this tavern? I find it hard to believe someone from the Unapproachable East is here in a place like this."

The old man laughed a little and Quel could tell he was mulling over whether to tell the whole truth or a portion of it. Finally he nodded after a couple of seconds and looked at all who were sitting at the table (conscious anyway) in the eye.

"I am looking for a young man by the name of Quel Tiin."

Quel managed to remain impassive when hearing this, but Flau who was far less experienced in the art of politics, had an open expression of wonder that could only mean "what a coincidence!" looking from Quel to the old man. Saida didn't give anything away and even though Flau hadn't given away much, to the eye of a trained manipulator she had given away volumes. The old man's eyes glinted knowingly. He now knew all he needed to know.

Quel sighed. _A bit shifty for an old man isn't he?_

Quel looked the man in the eye, any shred of pretense gone. "Alright, cut the crap old man, what do you want?"

The old man chuckled then grew quiet. "I was wondering if it was you or not. You don't match the description I was given very well."

"Where'd you get the description?" asked Saida, yakuza evil eye in full force.

The old man grinned like a wrinkled imp, "By my employer, where else stupid girl?"

Quel had a nervous smile as Saida fairly dug furrows into the table with her claw-like nails. She had a hard time controlling herself in situations like this.

"Can I ask you something gentle sir?" Quel said, smiling as a sudden thought dawned on him.

"Yes?" the old man asked, smiling with elderly benevolence.

Quel suddenly glared at him, "Stop lying immediately and tell us why you are here and what you really are."

The old man seemed momentarily speechless.

Saida perked up and inhaled deeply. "Hey now that you mention it he doesn't smell like an old man at all."

"He doesn't?" Flau asked, looking quizzically at her two companions like they were nuts.

"Nope." Quel said smiling mirthlessly.

Now the false old man was panicking, desperately looking for an escape route. Quel gripped his sword's hilt where it lay propped up next to his chair. It was an unmistakable gesture and one that stilled the imposter before he could do something foolish.

"Release your disguise or I will release it for you," ordered Quel, any trace of kindness gone from his demeanor.

Finally with a small sigh and a pop the old man vanished in a cloud of smoke. In his place sat a diminutive fox-like boy. He had fox fur, ears and tail and he was undoubtedly a yokai.

"A kitsune, eh?" Quel mused, posture relaxing. Then he jolted in surprise, "A kitsune!?"

"I'm just here to deliver a message to Master Quel!" squeaked the kitsune.

Saida cast a suspicious eye towards Quel. "What message?" she asked.

"Lady Shizune wishes for Master Quel to attend her at her upcoming gala." The kitsune said, holding up a wax sealed scroll.

"Who is this Shizune?" asked Saida.

"Shizune is an old acquaintance of mine, Quel said reluctantly, the words fairly grinding out of him. "I used to work for her a long time ago."

"Oh." Saida said, "Is that all you're here for fox boy?"

The kitsune nodded quickly.

"Why the act then?" Quel asked.

The kitsune looked sheepish. "Lady Shizune wanted me to test you sir. My apologies for the inconvenience I caused." He bowed formally.

"Well then. Thank you for the message. Tell Shizune that I will be there at the gala."

The kitsune smiled, its relief very apparent, and bowed again, "Thank you Master Quel." He hopped down from his seat and trotted out the tavern without a second glance back.

"What's his hurry?" asked Saida.

"You scared him I think." Quel said humorously.

Saida snorted and continued to drink her (Flau's) ale.

Unexpected guest aside, they focused now on the Zakharan unconscious at their table. Quel propped him up in his chair and came to stand next to Saida and Flau on the opposite side of the table.

"I'm going to go ask the owner of this tavern if she knows anything about Zakharan's being in the area." Quel said, rising from their table. The owner of the Elfsong Tavern, "Lady" Alyth Elendara was someone Quel had heard of before, but never met. She was a gorgeous half-elven woman with blond hair and pale skin that shined like alabaster.

"Lady Elendara." Quel asked her when he got to the bar. "Can you tell me anything about Zakharan's around Baldur's Gate?"

Lady Elendara paused in her polishing of her counter and looked quickly left and right. "Rumor has it Zakhara has sent an expedition of elite warriors to the Sword Coast," she whispered. "Last I heard Candlekeep was hosting a large party of mysterious strangers from a foreign land. Perhaps they are the expedition from Zakhara, perhaps not. That's all I can tell you."

Quel nodded and stood to go back to his table. "Thanks Lady that was more than enough." He tossed a small bag full of coins onto her counter, which promptly vanished.

"You're welcome stranger. Do come again." She flirted and he gave her a faint answering smile.

Back at the table Quel gave the gist of what he had been told and added two details. "This guy smells like he's been through a forest and the nearest forest I know of is the Cloak Woods. Candlekeep is on the other side of the wood too..."

Saida shrugged. "It's a better lead than anything else we've had recently." Flau jumped up out of her chair in excitement, "Alright, let's go!" Quel smiled, happy with the company he kept. "Right, but first I'll go hand this cheese dong over to the city watch." He hoisted the still unconscious Zakharan over one shoulder. "I'll meet you two at the southern gate."

Candlekeep would have been your typical sleepy keep in the countryside, with an idyllic vista all around it, except it had one unavoidable problem: all around the outside of its walls red tents of a distinctly eastern design were arranged in columns. The Zakharan expedition had come to Candlekeep. Surveying the monastery and the camp from the top of a nearby ridge, their heads barely even peeking over the ridge top, Saida, Quel and Flau looked at the horde of veiled warriors in desert garb with frustration.

"We can't sneak in this way," said Quel. "The entire perimeter of Candlekeep is heavily watched."

"There must be over a thousand of them!" Flau breathed in wonder.

"I'd say twelve-hundred," Saida agreed, "Far, far too many for just any old expedition."

"This is something big," Quel said. "Hopefully this is what Sharess wanted us to discover. I can't imagine this is just a coincidence."

The three of them backed down the ridge on their knees and when they were out of sight of the keep got back up and dusted themselves off.

"We need an alternate way in and I know just the person who can help us," Quel said, as he led the three of them back towards Baldur's Gate.

Flau and Saida groaned at the sight of the long road back to the city.

After walking back up the road towards Baldur's Gate for a few hours, Quel turned off the road and began wandering through the Cloakwood. Saida and Flau were perplexed by his chosen path, but followed him.

"Where are we going Quel?" asked Flau.

"To a sheltered community of sneaks and thieves," he replied casually. "I'm not sure they'll still be where they were last, but I want to check anyway."

Through still ravines and under sylvan shadows they trod, over hills, through valleys and across creek beds. They encountered more than a few of the wood's more dangerous inhabitants, but the resulting fights were too inconsequential to be remembered, one-hit kills mostly. After a few hours had turned into many miles they arrived at their destination. Sheltered in the shadows of numerous trees, in the silent heart of the Cloakwood, with the far off echo of the surf breaking against the cliffs the loudest thing to hear, they found a hidden community.

Humanoids stood arrayed in front of them. They had birdlike talons instead of hands and feet, beady black eyes, dark brown feathers and big beaks instead of mouths. There were a good dozen of them with bows fully drawn, pointed at Quel, Saida and Flau. These were kenku, a dark race of petty thieves and sneaks who lived in hidden communities dotted all across southern Faerûn. It was rare to see a community this far north. An odd assortment of homes dotted the landscape behind the kenku, spread out haphazardly within the long confines of the dell.

"Where is your elder?" asked Quel, calmly. "Tell him a Shielder has come."

The kenku stirred nervously at this and one ancient kenku, its feathers completely silver, stepped forwards in front of its brethren.

"Who invokes the name of the honored Shielders?" the silver kenku rasped, voice gravelly and sibilant. "Show your proof of that declaration."

Quel bent over and showed the kenku elder the pendant he wore around his neck. The elder stared at the pendant for many moments, silence filling the tense dell.

"He is what he proclaims he is," the elder finally said. "Let them speak."

Quel stood back up to his full height and spoke to all of the kenku. "I am looking for a hidden way into Candlekeep. Do you know of such a way?"

None of them wanted to move, all were afraid to volunteer. After a few minutes more of uncomfortable silence one kenku stepped forwards hesitantly, he was a bit more disheveled than the others and carried himself feebly, like a victim of abuse. The elder nodded crisply. "Genti will show you the way," he said, sagacious head bobbing in accord with his words.

Genti looked like he loved the idea of guiding our trio to the hidden way, so excited he looked terrified.

Genti guided them swiftly through the Cloakwood to the very heart of the wood. There he found a cave that led down into the earth. Torches were waiting for them, unlit in their brackets and needing only tinder to light them again. Now they made haste and passed down into the bowels of a natural cave that snaked and twisted down before narrowing radically, forcing the four of them to squeeze through. After squeezing through the crevice with only the light of their torches to guide them for what seemed like ages they finally arrived in a mini chamber that was connected to a long passage via a small crack in the wall that forced them to toss their torches to get through. Then they squeezed through to fall out on the other side, Saida first, Flau second, Quel third and Genti last.

Once all four of them had come out in the passage they could see that they were now on subterranean tracks, which meant they must be in the Cloakwood Mines, long since abandoned. The crack was hard to see even in the torchlight as it had somehow been worn smooth on this end and it was at an angle, so you could only see it from one end. The passageway was narrow—only about six feet wide, but it was about twelve feet tall. The perfect height for mine carts to traverse rapidly.

Genti immediately set out to their left, down deeper into the mine. Now their pace really picked up speed, Genti fairly running down the passages, urging them on in hushed tones. It didn't take a genius to see something was wrong. Genti had to be afraid of something and it was probably an insatiable eater if lady luck had any say in the matter.

"Genti," Saida loudly whispered, making the unfortunate kenku jump. "What are you so afraid of?"

"N-nothing," he choked out. "I j-just want to h-hurry t-to the p-p-passageway."

Quel and Saida shared a look. "Genti," Quel said. "That was the first sentence you've given us that wasn't one word, we know something's up."

Just as Genti opened his mouth to talk they heard it: a screeching, hissing, warbling cry echoing down the passage from the direction they were headed. Genti paled visibly and tried to run past Quel and Saida, but they just each grabbed him by his elbows and didn't let go as he struggled pitifully against their iron grips.

"Let me go!" he wailed. "It's already gotten two of my cousins in the last year!"

"What has!?" retorted Quel, just as loudly.

Now they could hear rapid footfalls, it sounded more like many _It's_were coming towards them, and fast. Saida tossed her torch far down the passageway, in the direction of the approaching It.

"I must get away!" Genti screamed hysterically, trying to peck Quel's arm.

Quel growled in frustration and knocked Genti unconscious with one swift blow. He tossed the surprisingly light kenku at Flau. "Here, catch him," he said belatedly.

Flau caught him, but fell over backwards with a small cry of surprise as well.

"Stay behind us!" Saida roared to Flau. Quel was standing shoulder to shoulder with Saida, drawing forth his zanpakuto, his soul cutting, sentient sword. Better to go all out for the time being.

Then, weird cries growing louder, footfalls becoming deafening, it appeared within the glow cast by the torch that had been tossed down the passageway. A giant hairy spider with venom dripping off of its mandibles, it was so large it couldn't navigate the passage normally. It had to rapidly walk on the wall, its girth filling up the passage from ceiling to floor, all twelve feet of it. Its eight beady eyes feasted hungrily on the sight of them all, glinting evilly.

Quel screamed in fear, Flau shrieked in terror and Saida roared with blood lust. The giant spider hissed/warbled back at them, spitting venom across the sides of the passageway. Saida punched the air in the direction of the giant spider, sending shock waves towards it that staggered and slowed it, but did not stop it.

"I wish I had my pistols right now!" Quel lamented as he charged in for close combat, Saida's shock waves passing over and around him. The giant spider hissed and spat a glob of poison at him as he drew near. Quel sidestepped it quickly and slammed himself into the wall. The spider leaped at him, dislodging debris from the passageway ceiling. Quel roared in defiance and slashed at its mandibles as it closed, towering over him. He missed as it leaned back adroitly for such a large and cumbersome body. It was focused on Quel so Saida used that moment to do a flying leap kick, landing a direct hit to the side of its large head and stunning it.

The spider fell off of the wall, partially landing on Quel who cried out in surprise and half fell and half got tossed backwards by the wave of air the giant spider created with its impact. It began to frantically wave its legs around, trying to pick itself up off the ground. Saida and Quel used this lull in the fight to discuss strategy. They huddled up together to talk, keeping an eye on the spider as they did.

"We can't kill it here," Quel said. "It would block our progress down the passage."

"Agreed," said Saida. "But we also can't leave it here either."

"Right, new plan then!" said Quel exuberantly.

"Which is?" Saida asked, quizzically.

The spider chose that moment to right itself, hissing and screaming in a shrill, yet sonorous voice.

"Follow my lead!" yelled Quel, charging at the spider.

It turned to regard him with even more malice in its gaze, if that was possible. Quel cried out a quick incantation as he ran: "_Hadō #31. Shakkahō!" _A large ball of deep red flame shot out from Quel's outstretched left hand and quickly engulfed the giant spider, full in the face. The blast of red flame lit up the passageway for yards. It didn't catch the spider on fire sadly, but it did make it scream in pain and fear for the first time in the fight. The spider paused and then tried to lunge at Quel, but he had already prepared another fire spell.

He fired multiple balls of red flame at the spider, making it's screams echo into the far reaches of the mines. It slowly started to retreat, as if it's body was moving of its own volition. Then it got momentum and it really started to backpeddle. So much so that Quel had to jog a bit to keep up the pressure. Saida and Flau, still holding Genti, followed at a slower pace. Saida carried her discarded torch and Quel's; he had thrown his to the side in the heat of the moment. Flau was carrying her torch as well. It was a bit dimmer after having dropped it when she had caught Genti, but it still worked. They all ran like this for some time, until the giant spider reached an intersection and managed to orient itself forwards, taking off like a rocket, an eight-legged, hairy rocket.

Quel let it go for about a hundred yards before he unleashed a silvery blue crescent wave of energy from his zanpakuto. It sped along the passageway, cutting through the floor and ceiling, caving in the passage as it went. The giant spider tried to increase its pace but the energy crescent took it full in the abdomen and detonated upon impact. The passage caved in completely at this point, so the outcome of Quel's deadly attack was not witnessed. If it did survive it would be sorely wounded for a long, long time.

Quel gently began slapping Genti's _cheeks_with the back of his hand. He did this for quite some time, never increasing the force of his slapping, making it gentle. Saida and Flau loomed over him as he did this. Silence, with the occasionally rock shifting in the caved in tunnel the only sound, dominated in the passageway.

"This is impractical," Saida said after five minutes spent watching Quel. "Let me have a try at waking him."

"Alright," Quel said as he stood up and took both his and her torch in his hands. Saida crouched down next to Genti and gently lifted his head up to speak to him. "WAKE UP YOU UGLY BIRD!" she roared in Genti's ear, causing Genti to awaken with a shock and making an impressive echo travel throughout the caverns.

Quel, ears ringing, gave Saida an annoyed look. "Remind me never to let you wake anyone again," he said deadpan.

_If there's anything else down here it knows we're here now._

"Sure thing," Saida said cheerfully as she hoisted Genti back onto his feet. Genti looked numb, so shocked was he. Quel gently shook him by his shoulders to get his attention. Genti slowly came out of his stupor and looked Quel in the face and then he blinked and saw Flau and Saida looking at him. Genti shook himself off like he had just been doused with water.

Genti, sadness and resignation apparent in his posture looked up at Quel. "I suppose you want me to still show you the way?" Quel nodded, remaining silent. Genti sighed and gestured for everyone to follow him deeper into the mines. He led them down, down into the bowels of the mines. Few had tread where he now led them, into back passages and disused mining areas, past collapsed caves and through web covered caves. The giant spider had covered a lot of ground, or else had lots of little and not so little children lurking all over.

Finally, after what seemed days, Genti stopped before a dead end at what must have been the lowest tunnel in the entire mine. Genti shuffled up to the blank wall and gestured for everyone to come up next to him. The blank wall was in actuality a door. Ancient and forgotten, its original purpose had been lost to time.

"This is where I leave you," Genti said, voice suddenly loud in the silence. "I will go no farther. You must douse your torches here, they are not allowed on the other side,"—he held out his talons for their torches— "Take the left path whenever you come to a crossroads and whatever you do, do not leave the glowing path."

"Why?" asked Saida, in alarm.

Genti gazed up at her most wickedly, there was no love lost between them. "Stay on the path," he repeated darkly. Then he doused their torches with a crude metal cup that had been set into the wall uncounted years earlier, now it was charred and blackened by soot to be nearly unrecognizable. Pitch blackness suddenly enveloped them and Flau gave out a tremulous squeak. Saida and Quel remained silent, using the other senses besides their eyes to understand their environment.

Genti's rapid talonfalls receded quickly, fading away within moments. Moments later, Quel and Saida's well tuned eyes noticed a very faint glow appear around the frame of the door. Quel moved to open it, but Saida stopped him and shook her head in the very dim light. Trusting her, Quel grabbed Flau and positioned himself next to the door, sword out and at the ready. Saida grabbed the frame of the giant stone door and heaved it open, crying out in surprise as it easily swung outwards on metal hinges set deep into the stone. Quel moved forward and examined the door more closely.

"It's definitely dwarven craftsmanship," he stated calmly. "But why craft a door down here and who would craft such a door to begin with?"

"Beats me," Saida said, offhandedly. "I doubt we'll ever know."

"Can we get out of here soon, please?" Flau asked, unhappily.

"Yes," Quel answered Flau, turning to look at Saida as he did so. "Let's make haste."

Saida nodded and took the lead down the tunnel. The ceiling, floor and walls were covered in a soft growth of bioluminescent lichen. It gave off a faint tourmaline glow that was pleasing to the eye. The door was easily closed behind them. They continued down, ever deeper, for many miles. Silence their only companion, for none of them wanted to talk. Quel mused much about his current situation in life and his eyes came to rest on the youngest, most inexperienced and earnest member of their trio. Flau was easily taking her place as the third party member on their team. Serious combat had yet to test her, but Quel was confident she would survive such a test with flying colors. A subtle changed greeted Saida's eyes far ahead and soon resolved itself into a dramatic change to their path. The trio eyed the path ahead with much suspicion. After miles of the same lichen covered tunnel they suddenly found themselves looking at a giant underground cathedral of a cavern, the walls and ceiling vanishing into the darkness.

Darkness, looming and intense, surrounded them in that chamber. Dripping sounds echoed in that place, louder than a scream and somehow ominous. Quel had the feeling they were above a vast and deadly underground lake. Falling in was out of the question, though it dominated the worries of his mind at that time. Quel grasped his two leading ladies in his life right now by their hands and urged them to caution with his demeanor.

Quel took the lead and walked out into the large cavern, moving slowly along the narrow bridge of stone that was all that remained of their path. Saida and Flau soon followed. They all had to go in single file because the bridge was too narrow and unsafe for anything else. They preceded like this for the next few minutes, though it felt like hours in the dark. Soon Quel came upon diverging paths, but he ignored these because the lichen withered and would not grow on them. He encountered many of these light-less bridges as he continued. They made him nervous somehow. After a while Quel could see a change in the scenery far ahead: the glowing path became a glowing circle. This was because he could see that a new tunnel was far ahead, this one covered on its walls, floor and ceiling in lichen like the last. Quel's mood improved noticeably.

Then he heard the first splash. It echoed from far, far away, back the way they had come. All three stopped in mid stride, straining to listen back the way they had come. Nothing. Whatever it was it was being silent now. Quel wasn't happy, but he continued onwards. Then he stopped again, this time feeling something on a gut level, but not sensing anything. He scanned the cavern ahead of him and didn't notice anything besides the impenetrable darkness, the glowing circle of tourmaline lichen and the many paired shiny motes.

Quel looked closer. _Waitaminute…oh shit. _"Saida, Flau!" he roared, drawing his swords and causing a tumult of echoes, "AMBUSH!"

The cavern erupted in a tumult of monstrous roars as lizardmen sprang to the attack. They had concealed themselves well, but now they charged down the diverging bridges and onto the main glowing bridge in earnest. Saida and Flau faced a veritable horde from behind and Quel had to deal with the other arm in the pincer attack all on his own. The lizardmen carried sabers and tridents. They had large fins running down their backs and frilly fins in place of ears. They were green skinned and the shortest of them was six feet tall if he was one. They were burly and fierce in their demeanor. It was impossible to tell how many were attacking because of the dimness, but Quel had bigger problems to worry about at the moment.

Two tridents stabbed for his heart, Quel viciously parried them into each other and to the side. He stepped forwards and used his enemies' confusion to stab the left one in the gut, dispatching him quickly. That lizardman fell over the side of the bridge into the water below with a profound splash. The remaining lizardman took a step back, bumping into his reinforcements. Quel, who was wielding his zanpakuto in his right hand and his regular, though still powerful _Durandal_blade in his left hand, pressed forwards. Quel unleashed a flurry of overhead slashed aimed at his remaining opponents head. The lizardman raised his trident and parried most of them, but suffered two painful cuts to his head when two blows managed to slip through his guard. Quel could hear cries and the sounds of battle behind him, but didn't have time to take a look over his shoulder. He didn't dare to for fear that his two leading ladies were getting massacred and because he didn't have the opportunity to risk looking, leaving his guard open for a crucial second.

Another lizardman stepped forwards and tried to stab Quel in the chest again with it's saber. Quel adroitly ducked the blow by crouching down on his toes. The lizardmen, seeing this, tried to kick him in the face. Quel leaped up and over their kicks, parrying their expected trident and saber thrusts as he did so. He landed back on his feet and blocked a devious slash aimed at his ankle with one blade and slashed at the trident wielding lizardman with his other blade. His attack was parried and the lizardman wielding the trident riposted off of his blow, stabbing at his throat. Quel ducked to the side and back peddled. He came back up into a fighting stance with the trident-wielding lizardman charging at him, intending to impale him with the trident. Quel slashed the air in front of him with his zanpakuto, creating a gust of wind out of nowhere that tossed six of his attackers up into the air and carried them off into the darkness to slam violently against the walls and ceiling. Quel couldn't see them impact, but the meaty sounds of impact were unmistakable.

The lizardmen in front of him were hesitant to approach, so he charged them. A lizardman fell onto the glowing bridge behind him and tumbled off into the water below. Quel jumped, using his power to lift himself inhumanely high into the air. He slammed into his lizardmen foes knee first and carried three of them to the ground, riding the one under him to the ground, where he heard something snap in his opponent. He rose quickly to his feet and stabbed his two opponents in their chests before they had a chance to recover and stabbed the one he had crushed for good measure, before pressing the attack.

The lizardmen's ranks were breaking, fear overcoming their resolve to fight. As they broke and ran, Quel congratulated himself, turning to see how Saida and Flau were doing. He stopped in shock, knowing what the real reason the lizardmen had run away was.

Saida was covered, nay, splattered in blood. She was red from head to toe. Her eyes shone like twin motes of living fury, their intensity giving off a palpable aura of danger. Quel involuntarily took a step back, shocked and awed by the sight of her. Flau was half crouched half huddled behind Saida, placing her between Quel and Saida, and looked like she was in shock. Pieces of lizardmen lay scattered on the bridge that was not-so-glowy anymore, coated as it was in blood and gore, and there was no sign of any survivors of the cold blooded raiders.

"Uh," Quel said into the sudden silence that followed their battle. "You ok over there Saida…Flau?"

Flau looked over at Quel with big saucer eyes, the poor girl had just been exposed to as bloody a fight as she would likely ever see. Saida turned and regarded Quel, she was still dripping…

"We're fine," Saida said, too calmly. "These guys weren't a challenge."

"Right, well you do need a bath now Saida," Quel said tentatively.

Saida looked down and seemed to see all of the blood for the first time. She seemed slightly disgusted, but more than anything, apathetic to it all.

Looking up at Quel she shrugged. "I'll bathe as soon as I can. Let's continue."

Quel just nodded his head, slashed his blades through the air twice to clear off any loose blood on them and then wiped them down with a small cloth he carried. Sheathing his blades he bent down to get a closer look at one of the lizardmen's bodies. They were definitely sahuagin, a violent barbaric race of lizardmen that populated many worlds and usually dwelled in oceans, rivers, marshlands and underground bodies of water.

Quel shook his head in concern; this trip was beginning to feel a tad too dangerous. It felt like something more, like someone didn't want them to succeed. Remembering Sharess' words, Quel had a sinking feeling. _Nah, it can't be that's too out there to be true. _Quel shook himself out of his reverie and followed Saida and Flau, both of whom had gone ahead of him. He just couldn't shake the feeling he had though. He knew to beware whenever he felt like this. _With all that is at stake the gods of chaos and evil _could_be trying to get rid of us. _Years and years of experience told him his instincts were usually right. He mulled over his theory one more time, worried, over what he did not know. Things just didn't add up somehow. He felt like there was something missing that he didn't see, something crucial and perilous to ignore. But no matter how hard he scoured his brain, nothing came to the surface so he was left with his unease and nagging worry.

They continued on for hours, dozens of hours, always walking onwards in the gloom. Finally they reached the end of the glowing lichen covered path and they found a bracket containing a single unlit torch awaiting them. Lighting it took only a minute and then they continued on, the path now beginning to rise. They had traveled for miles underground and now they were starting to rise up to the surface, slowly but surely. They encountered no more difficulties, such as giant spiders or sahuagin hordes. Their underground hike was actually quite peaceful at this point.

Then, after slowly climbing up tunnels with an incline they reached an area that became less steep and more level. It was then that Quel felt the top of his head itch, and the sensation spread from the top of his head down to the base of his spine. They were being watched by something. Quel looked around the cave passage warily, noticing nothing he could sense, but knowing nonetheless that they were being watched.

Stopping Quel turned to his companions. "We're being watched," he said quietly.

Saida nodded. "I can't tell from where," she replied.

Flau looked everywhere, suddenly nervous.

"Don't worry Flau," Quel said. "We'll be fine."

That was when a disembodied, ghostly skeletal jaw appeared literally right in front of them. Flau screamed. Saida and Quel faced the apparition and tensely watched it. Silence dominated the cavern.

"Hello," said the ghostly jaw. "Surrender any and all books you have."

Quel quickly glanced over at Saida. "We don't have any books," he said.

Saida and Flau looked at him like he had two heads. He wasn't showing any surprise over a talking floating ghostly jaw. He acted like he did this sort of thing everyday!

"Of course you do!" the jaw continued exuberantly. "_Everyone_has books!"

"Well we don't at the moment," Quel said. "We're just trying to get into Candlekeep."

"Book thieves!" roared the jaw, without warning and making Quel, Saida and Flau jump. "You shall not pass!"

"We're not book thieves!" yelled Quel in return. "We need to see someone who's recently come to the monastery. They are linked to what's happening to the moon right now!"

The jaw stopped its angry accusations and tilted quizzically. "And what's happening to the moon…?" it asked, clearly intrigued.

Flau and Saida shoved Quel forwards, hiding behind him. "Uh, the moon has been darkened. Selûne has been kidnapped."

"Kidnapped!? Oh how wonderful!" the jaw fairly tittered over the news.

"Yes…Well…We are on a mission from the gods to find and save Selûne and Eilistraee, who has also been kidnapped," Quel said, subdued.

"Oh! How intriguing a story this is!" the jaw stopped tittering. "What does that have to do with Candlekeep?"

Quel suppressed his negative reactions diligently and continued. "A man we think is somehow involved in the kidnapping of the moon goddesses is inside Candlekeep, visiting from Zakhara."

Ah! I see now! You want to get into Candlekeep then?!"

"Yes!" Quel said, happy.

"Sorry, that's impossible."

"Why?" asked Quel wearily.

"Oh, I can't allow anyone to steal books from Candlekeep, you three look like prime examples of delinquents." The jaw said, then nodding at Saida, "Especially that one."

Saida, still covered in now dried sahuagin blood, raised her voice and her left fist angrily. "Look you stupid jaw, we need to get into that monastery and if you won't float off, we're getting through with force!"

"Oh I don't think so," said the jaw amused. "I have the remains of many other intruders here to serve as warnings if you'd like to see. I have defended Candlekeep for centuries and I will continue to do so. No one shall pass!"

Quel sighed. "I was afraid it would come to this," he said, looking up at the ghostly jaw. "Why are you here dragon?"

The jaws paused. "I was a foolish dragon in my youth. I ate one too many of the monks at Candlekeep and that damned sorcerer Torth!" roared the jaw, suddenly lost in its memories. "He bonded me in servitude to Candlekeep and then he had the nerve to die before my contract was fulfilled!" The jaw was fuming now, but then suddenly grew despondent. "My body withered and died not long after. I am bound to Torth's sarcophagus, forever serving the monastery."

"Right then, the answer is simple!" Quel said exuberantly. "You just need to be released from your bondage to allow us to pass, but I doubt I can release you now."

The jaw was "gazing" at Quel with unreadable intensity.

Quel pressed on, ignoring the jaw. "If I promise on my ancestor's honor to release you from your servitude will you let us pass?"

"You are not the first to promise such things," the jaw said with a staggering amount of bitterness. "I will not be so easily tricked mortal. Your deaths will be doubly painful for your false promises!"

The jaws expanded, preparing to descend upon them. Saida yelled Quel's name urgently and Quel raised his hands to fend off any blow.

"I promise on the honor of the Kestävä!" yelled Quel, resignation mixing with dread in his voice.

The jaw froze in mid bite and then pulled back and slowly closed. A deafening silence then ensued as the jaw took in Quel's words, his sudden oath. Saida and Flau were hugging each other tightly, looking at Quel and the jaw nervously. Then Flau seemed to remember what Saida was covered in and disentangled herself from their shared embrace, coming away stickily.

"Alright," the jaw finally said, making Flau freeze as she was contemplating retching. "You have invoked their name human. Whoever you are, you face a steep price should you fail to honor your words."

Quel nodded solemnly. "I know exactly what I have done and I never go back on my word. I will free you, though it may take a while."

The jaws nodded, somehow accomplishing that gesture without a head or neck to be attached to. "I will be waiting human. My name is Miirym, tell me yours."

Quel knew this had been coming, this was a dragon he was dealing with after all. "My name is Quel," he said.

"I will hold you to your oath," Miirym said sternly. "Our deal is off should you damage or take any of Candlekeep's books."

"I understand. No harm will come to Candlekeep's books and I will uphold my oath to you. Thank you Miirym."

The jaws vanished into thin air with one final sardonic snort as farewell. The three of them encountered no more obstacles, living or nonliving, in their journey to Candlekeep. Saida and Flau regarded Quel oddly, like he had three heads. He knew it was because of how he had garnered passage for the three of them past the monastery's subterranean guardian. He wouldn't and couldn't tell them the reason why it had been so easy for Miirym to agree to his vow.

His past was too sorrowful and intricate to share with anyone without the light of day as a comfort blanket. The burdens and joys of his past would be revealed in time, but it was far too soon to share such things with such innocent and beautiful women. Far, far too soon. His past pain and joy he would hide just a bit longer.

Candlekeep was waiting for them and within its halls they would discover the start to an adventure of a lifetime.


	10. 9 Showdown at Candlekeep

_**Chapter Nine: Showdown at Candlekeep!**_

**Toril, Candlekeep, September 27th, 1391 a.c.**

They came up out of the Upper Underdark in the cellars of Candlekeep. It was quiet enough that a silencing spell wouldn't have produced any noticeable difference. Quel took point, cautiously leading Flau and Saida towards the higher levels of the monastery. They passed many crates and barrels full of supplies and a fine coat of dust was on everything, with the recent footprints of passing monks the only islands in the sea of dustiness.

They arrived at a spiral staircase that led up to the next level of the monastery. Saida shoved her way to the front of their small group and went up first, Quel gestured for Flau to go next and he went last, looking behind back the way they had come to make sure they weren't being followed or anything like that.

When he got to the next floor he discovered they were in a shabby section of the monk's living quarters. Saida was tiptoeing down a corridor that led towards the lower levels of the library. Looking out one of the small slits in the wall that allowed light to filter in through dirty glass Quel saw it was deep into the night. They had been underground for over seven hours. Everything was suspiciously quiet. No one was about within Candlekeep on that night. Saida led the way out of the back areas where the monks lived and up more than a few staircases towards the only place that had the sounds of activity emanating from it.

The activity turned out to be a small feast for the Zakharans. Candlekeep monks flocked around the Zakharan warriors, ensuring their every whim was adhered to. It was pathetic to look at and sad, if you considered isolationist monks being enslaved by traveling foreigners something sad. Quel, Saida and Flau had come out on a corridor that paralleled and was above the dining hall. They had four travel options: go back the way they had come, jump over the small balcony in front of them and land in the midst of the majority of the Zakharan expedition, or go either left or right to different areas of the monastery. The expedition leader was easily enough spotted at the head of the long table that groaned under the weight of what was undoubtedly the entirety of Candlekeep's provisions. He had on a fine set of silk clothes dyed a deep golden color and his sharp black goatee was trimmed expertly. He was not one to miss an opportunity to impress.

Quel had just noticed another door across the dining hall that was unguarded and was about to suggest to his friends that they circle around and try to find their way to that door when he noticed they had been discovered.

A man that stood at least 10 feet tall, dressed in fine light blue silks with gold stitching, and having a fine muscular physique boldly pressing forth from beneath the silken garments that he wore gazed at them dispassionately with his piercing light blue eyes. He had appeared out of one of the doorways to their right. Wordlessly the man opened his hands, scattering some fine substance in the air before him.

"Shit," Quel said, making Saida and Flau spin around to see the tall man. "He's a djinn," Quel said with resignation.

The djinn smiled wickedly and vanished. In his place appeared two three headed dogs, Cerberus, that grew to be the size of mini giants, bumping into the corridor walls and fencing the trio in. They snapped their many and powerful jaws, slobber hitting the ground around our trio's feet.

By now the Zakharan expedition had discerned what the commotion was and was ferrying their leader away to the safety of their caravan's camp. The Candlekeep monks are running around in a panic, like chickens with their heads cut off. Fortunately for them the Zakharans were too focused on escape to harm any of the monks.

"Ignore the Cerberus's," Quel said over his shoulder. "They're illusions"

Saida was wary, but trusted Quel's assessment from using her nose alone. Flau was more frightened of them than anything else, but even she understood they weren't real when they didn't do anything except slobber and growl at the hallway entrance our trio had passed through, totally ignoring where Quel, Saida and Flau now stood at the balcony.

Laughter echoed from high above them and they looked up to see the tall man with the cold blue eyes floating up near the dining hall's ceiling.

"You are no ordinary interlopers methinks," the djinn said, his voice a full and deep baritone that thrummed with power.

"You have that right my elemental friend," Quel said humorously. "Now can you tell us why a Zakharan Caliph would send an expedition to this monastery?"

The djinn shook his head sadly. "Unfortunately for you I have orders to kill anyone who impedes our progress." The djinn sighed, lamenting his position in life. "And you have such prime examples of womanly beauty beside you. A pity."

Saida flipped him off with her whole arm, Quel just smiled up at the djinn and Flau unsheathed her dagger.

"Then again I might be mistaken. Your small traveling harem is a dismal example of the proper feminine etiquette."

Saida's ears twitched and her posture grew stiff. "I'm sorry, but you'll have to do better than that to sound offensive," she hissed.

A gust of wind suddenly tore upwards at the djinn. Quel had drawn his zanpakuto and unleashed a wind attack in one fell swoop. The djinn didn't even bother to dodge the attack, letting it hit and pass through him. He laughed and his form melted into a giant whirlwind that filled the room. Their hair and clothing were tugged upwards and it soon grew deafening to be in that room.

"Move!" Quel yelled over the djinn's roaring wind, "We must get to the Zakharan expedition!" Saida and Flau took the lead down the left-hand passage, running recklessly at full speed.

Quel stayed at the rear of the running trio. As the djinn sought to hit them with gusts of his own wind, Quel would divert them to crash into the walls floor and ceiling. Large furrows began to dot the corridor as they progressed onwards. The djinn's roars of frustration could be heard from within his whirlwind. Quel was turning aside and countering every wind attack he had. Finally, after traversing at least one-hundred feet's worth of the corridor's twisting and turning length the djinn altered his plan of attack.

He touched down to the ground with his whirlwind, causing an immediate flurry of dust and debris to rise up and engulf the corridor. Quel, Saida and Flau immediately started hacking from the dust and lost complete sight of the djinn. Quel easily countered this move by stopping and gathering more than a little energy to unleash one huge blast of wind that sent all of the dust, debris and the djinn himself tumbling down the passageway. The blast of wind Quel created was so powerful that it shook the corridor, and exploded through many windows on the opposite side of the keep, expelling a huge cloud of dust and debris into the air. Thankfully they were not in the library itself but in the upper living quarters of the monks, so no books were damaged. Hundreds of years worth of dust just got expelled outside of the keep. The djinn dizzily tried to recover outside.

Quel ran after Saida and Flau, catching up to them as they entered the main entry hall to Candlekeep and stood looking out from a balcony set in the higher recesses of the hall. The Zakharans were making all haste in their departure from Candlekeep.

"They must already have what they came for," Quel said softly. "Do we want to attack them now, or do we wait until they're away from here?"

"Screw waiting!" Saida said loudly, causing some Zakharan heads to turn and making Quel and Flau cringe. "I'm beating the pulp out of that bastard now!"

And with that she jumped over the side of the balcony, dropping the thirty feet to the ground with ease. She took off at a lightning quick jog and leaped into the midst of the nearest bundle of Zakharans. Their screams of terror and rage began to echo off of the ceiling.

Quel sighed and gave Flau a mournful look. "Now we have to beat the entire expedition…ready?" His sentence ended in a falsely upbeat tease as he asked Flau the question.

"Sure thing boss," Flau said sarcastically back, humor plain in her eyes. "You can't live forever after all."

Quel created a cushion of air for Flau and him to stand on and they floated majestically to the ground as a grizzly symphony of painful crunching, cracking and squelching sounds emanated from where Saida was beating a group of grown warriors from Zakhara. They were quickly becoming a gaggle of puny girly men after an encounter with the wild cat-girl. Quel had to laugh at the way they were scattering to get away from her and how she would still beat them up by sending shock waves out of her hands to slam them repeatedly from behind.

By the time Quel and Flau joined her in the middle of the entry hall every Zakharan was down, all one-hundred plus of them. Saida led the way out of the entry hall, which had become as silent as a tomb, and out onto the top of the Path of the Lion. Quel stopped, seeing a still conscious veiled warrior moaning limply on the ground. He approached the man and yanked him up a few feet by the collar of his shirt.

"Why have you come to this monastery?!" he demanded.

The man babbled in his foreign language, his words incomprehensible to Quel's ears. Letting go of the man with a disgusted sigh, Quel committed the unknown phrase the man had repeated to memory and followed Saida and Flau. Whatever _Kitab min Qamar_ meant it was important.

The Path of the Lion was the only way to enter Candlekeep normally. It was a steep, narrow bridge of land that descended to the ground with sheer drops on either side, not unlike Durin's Bridge.

They took this path at a run, dangerously speeding down the path. Warriors of Zakhara stood in their way in single file, each wielding spears to bar their way. Saida simply cocked her left arm, held it there for a few seconds storing energy, and then she punched forwards violently, war cry following. A shock wave of stupendous force erupted from her fist and sped down the path, knocking the spear wielding Zakharans flying like bowling pins in an alley. The shock wave ended its path of carnage at the foot of the Path of the Lion and detonated in a big cloud of dust and dirt.

Behind the cloud of debris Quel could see the main expedition party running to get away. Four men stayed behind. Quel, Saida and Flau arrived at the foot of the Path a little later, stopping to catch their breaths and survey their new foes. Bodies of fallen Zakharans littered the ground all about the base of the Path, some of the moaning but most too far gone to do even that much.

Each of the four wore black robes and carried their own personal weapons. The leftmost and bulkiest of the four wielded a giant scimitar as tall as he was and sharper than it's wielder's wits. The second man in from the left wielded a long spear that had a red mane of dyed fur designed to catch and hold the eye. The second man in from the right wielded a set of two daggers, connected by a chain in the middle that hung down in front of him as he walked. The rightmost warrior wielded a bandolier of different grenades, two of which he had in his right hand, gripped haphazardly. A small lighting device was poised in his other hand, ready to strike the first spark.

All four carried themselves with an air of experience. They were trained assassins, merciless and cruel. It was a 3 vs 4 fight. There was no chance for escape as the bombardier assassin lit and tossed his grenades too quickly. Quel, Saida and Flau all dodged away from the grenades, but all three still got tossed by the shock waves. Saida came up in a roll and launched multiple shock waves at the assassins, making them scatter but doing no damage.

Saida charged at the bombardier, but he just tossed down a smoke bomb that enveloped the entire field. Quel, seeing this dispersed the cloud of smoke with a gust of wind. The bombardier was only able to go a few dozen feet under the cover of the smoke before Saida locked on target again and sent multiple shock waves at him. He countered by throwing multiple grenades as her, each of which hit a shock wave and was sent hurtling back to explode near him. This in turn sent him scrambling for his life, only one bare step ahead of his own grenades. He was in an impossible situation: if he stopped throwing grenades he would be safe from blowing off his own feet, but if he did stop Saida would finish him with a precise shock wave.

The assassin with the spear went to the aid of his grenade loving cohort and managed to get in close to Saida, well within spear reach of her. He thought this was safer than being far away where her shock waves could hit him without him being able to do anything. He was wrong.

Saida easily dodged his first devious sneak attack to the back of her head, dropping and rolling to the side. She pivoted on her hands and did two quick kicks in succession before pushing up off from the ground with her arms to land back on her feet. Her two kicks had managed to be blocked by the spear wielder, but he had distracted her from his bombardier friend. Both seemed to be breathing easier for having taken the initiative. They were about to get a rude awakening to the reality of the situation, but first an update on the rest of the battlefield.

Quel was charging the assassin wielding the scimitar as large as he was and Flau was going for the dual knife assassin. Only Saida, with her strong leg muscles, had managed to enter the fray ahead of everyone else.

Back with Saida, the spear wielder aimed a rapid series of thrusts and stabs at Saida's torso, hoping to end the battle quickly perhaps. Haste makes waste and in this situation it was no different as the rapidity of the spearwielder's thrusts made them lack force and without there being any force to the blows Saida easily grabbed the spear and crushed it with only one hand. Her finger strength was unreal. Having only a brief second to stare at the ruin of his spear, the spear-now-turned-staff wielding assassin looked up in time to see his spearhead enter his chest at a high velocity after being thrown by Saida.

Saida's victory was robbed from her as the bombardier assassin had been preparing a large display of his fireworks mastery. He had retrieved an antiquated missile from his backpack and aimed it at Saida and had fired it just as she had broken the spear, making it so that the rocket exploded right next to Saida as soon as the spear wielding assassin was dropping dead. Saida went flying, darkness enveloping her senses.

Half a minute earlier Quel and Flau had made contact with their adversaries, trading a rapid series of blows. Quel had come in like a whirling dervish and hit his opponent's large sword multiple times in the same area, making him give ground step by step. In under thirty seconds Quel had spun no less than twenty times and had hit his opponent's sword no less than forty times, each blow by both his blades scratching and eventually slightly cutting the scimitar. The explosion ended Quel's assault, the shock wave making him hesitate long enough to get hit by the flat of the giant scimitar blade. He was sent flying through the air to hit the ground and roll to his feet. The scimitar now had a noticeable cut in it halfway along the blade. Not enough to cause any permanent damage though.

Flau had used the first half minute of her fight equally as well. She had started out by aiming a rapid series of blows at her opponent's left leg, each of which had been blocked by one or the other blades. After trading six or so blows the assassin managed to wrap the chain around Flau's dagger and pull it out of her hand. Flau, knowing she would be easily killed if she allowed that to happen unchallenged, leaped at the assassin as her dagger left her hand, landing a solid elbow slam to the knife wielding assassin's chest. It was then that the explosion hit and Flau and the assassin were knocked to one knee by their proximity to the blast. Flau was able to recover her balance after a few seconds, but the assassin, who had just had been elbowed to the chest, fell over flat.

Quel, seeing Saida's unconscious and injured form and the bombardier assassin readying three grenades to throw to finish her off, lost his cool. A violent shock wave of wind erupted out of his body, which knocked his scimitar wielding opponent to the ground, buffeted Flau's knife wielding opponent, who was already on the ground, and made the bombardier stagger.

Quel swung his blade in the bombardier's direction and sent a wave of silvery energy towards him, cutting up and plowing through the ground on its way. The energy wave cut the ground in a clean stroke all the way to his target, exactly as if a giant blade had cut the land itself. This attack was one of Quel's unique techniques his zanpakuto possessed. It was known as the _Kazekiba Henka no Ginga_, the Galactic Windfang of Change. The only more audaciously outrageous title for an attack had to be Moonfang Piercer of the Heavens. It exploded in a huge cloud of debris, obscuring the fate and welfare of the bombardier.

Everybody else had recovered by now and Quel barely managed to turn and block the giant scimitar from cutting him in half with both of his swords. He was sent flying to roll and bounce on the ground for yards before his momentum stopped. Flau attacked her foe by leaping into the air and aiming an overhead stab to slam into their chest. The knife wielding opponent tossed one of their knives lightening quick into the air, but Flau managed to dodge to the side in midair, only realizing as she did so the position of here opponent's arm and that it was a clever feint. That was when the knife wielding assassin tugged viciously on the chain, sending the knife that was now behind Flau back the way it had come, like a descending guillotine.

Flau desperately spun in midair, straining her back and spine as she did so, trying to turn and catch the knife. She was partly successful, managing only to catch the handle of the knife and suffering a minor puncture to her chest at the same time. Then she landed with a painful crash, on her opponent! The chain whipped around, almost slithering, and the knife wielding assassin began to choke Flau from behind. Flau gave up on blocking the knife with her dagger as that had only been a ruse within a ruse. She belatedly realized all of this as she futilely began to yank at the chain around her neck. Her brain's thought patterns were becoming fuzzy…She didn't have much time…Where was everyone? Quel? ...Saida?

Meanwhile, a minute earlier in the complicated fight to the death, Quel had regained his feet. Seeing Saida down and out, the bombardier hopefully dead within the cloud of slowly dispersing debris, his opponent raising his gargantuan blade over one shoulder and ponderously charging Quel in what looked like slow motion and Flau leaping at her opponent to land the finishing blow, Quel relaxed imperceptibly.

That was when he almost died.

His slow moving foe looked top heavy, so Quel aimed a gale force blast of wind at his feet, hoping to knock him over. Instead the giant scimitar wielding assassin had the gall to laugh as the wind tore at his black robes. He crouched, enduring the wind in a position that made it looked like he was having a bowel movement in his pants but granted him a strong balanced defensive position no matter how awkward it looked.

Focusing on his scimitar wielding foe Quel almost didn't hear the fizzling sound until it was too late, But he did hear it, the softness of the sound giving away the gravity of his situation on an instinctual level.

Quel leaped into the air and shot a gust of wind at his feet to toss himself even higher, twenty feet into the air to be exact. Looking down he beheld multiple small grenades on a string, looking vaguely like a sparking and fizzling centipede. Even as he saw them they detonated, making a nice crater ten feet around where he had been standing and sending up a plume of fire, smoke and debris that engulfed him as he ascended.

Coming out of the bottom of the cloud a second later, tendrils of it clinging to his form, Quel scanned the battlefield and saw multiple reasons for alarm. Saida was still out cold and the bombardier had just tossed another string of small grenades at her. They were in midair as Quel spotted them. His scimitar opponent was charging ponderously over to Flau's personal fight and Flau was down, slowly being strangled to death.

Things looked bleak. The tide of battle had shifted badly in disfavor for them, but it wasn't over yet, not by far. Quel used his anger as a fuel that saved those who knew how to use it on the battlefield. He had to act quickly—very, very quickly.

Calling on the wind and using his affinity with it to the utmost of his remaining ability, Quel called on more of his power than he usually did. Far more. He didn't have much time, but he used it all. His eyes snapped open, his expression changed to any who could see it, but none did. He strained to hold the vast reservoir of power he was using without letting it consume him or fainting from its pressure. He first made a disk of wind for his feet to stand on and for him to have a bird's eye view of the battlefield.

The explosives had already landed beside Saida and they were literally a second from detonating when Quel slammed them with a gust of wind, making Saida roll a few feet and tossing the grenades back at the bombardier, who looked at them in wide-eyed dismay as they blew up in his face.

Next, Quel slammed the giant scimitar wielding assassin with a gust of wind that Quel put a little bite into, causing the assassin's clothes to be ripped apart on his back and numerous gashes to appear, bright red blood welling up to the surface. The scimitar wielding assassin stumbled and had to prop himself up on his blade. Simultaneously Quel put a bubble of air around the knife wielding assassins head, sucking all oxygen out of the bubble and slowly asphyxiating them as they strangled Flau.

Flau's weak struggles suddenly grew with renewed strength as she got air into her lungs. The knife wielding assassin under her flailed about in a vain attempt to gain air for their lungs. Quel was not entirely inhuman, he waited until he knew that the knife wielding assassin could not struggle anymore, but was not dead and then dispersed his air bubble.

Surveying the field from his position in the sky, Quel saw the bombardier assassin dead from his own explosives, the knife assassin unconscious from lack of oxygen, the scimitar assassin stumbling back to his feet, barely able to stand from the many deep cuts Quel had dealt him on his back, the spear assassin dead from Saida's good timed spearhead toss and in the distance the dust cloud that marked the rapid departure of the Zakharan caravan.

They had failed to apprehend the expedition's leader, but they knew where he was going. They had only to follow him.

Next stop Zakhara.

Quel, not accustomed to using this much power after so long, fell from twenty feet up in the air, his two swords falling out of his limp hands. He was unconscious before he hit the ground.


	11. 10 Unscheduled Lostness

_**Chapter Ten: Unscheduled Lostness**_

**Toril, Baldur's Gate, September 28th, 1391 a.c.**

A day had passed since their battle at the foot of Candlekeep. Quel was still recuperating from his overuse of his reiatsu, Saida was fine, minus one bump on her head and hurt pride and Flau was fine if a little shaken up over nearly being strangled to death. Aside from those _minor_ reminders of their fight they were in tip-top shape!

The two surviving assassins had been interrogated heavily by Quel and Saida, with Flau watching, and after half a day of rigorous interrogation techniques they had very little to show for it.

What they did know was that the expedition to Candlekeep was returning home by boat, that it was led by a man by the name of al-Hidayat, a minor caliph from Huzuz, in the court of the Grand Caliph himself and that the expedition's mission had been to acquire _something_ important from the monks of Candlekeep. Quel knew it was called the Kitab min Qamar, but that was about it. Now if he could speak the foreign Zakharan language they would be a great deal wiser, but it mattered not in the grand scheme of things.

They knew very little, but it was a start and as they lay there in their hotel room at the Elfsong Tavern they all drearily pondered their lives, listening to the faint melody of the ghostly elf woman's voice.

"So now we have to go halfway across this god forsaken planet ON FOOT?!" Saida suddenly demanded, jumping to her feet.

"Yes and no," Quel grumped back. "I have enough money to hire a wizard to teleport us to Zakhara. We just need to find one that knows where Zakhara is."

"How hard can that be?" Flau asked, worried.

"Not hard," Quel said.

"Just as long as we don't get scammed I'm fine with teleporting," Saida replied as she picked up and ate an apple.

"Most wizards usually know not to anger their clients," Quel said, amused.

"Yeah, well I just have misgivings about what we're doing right now," Saida said between bites.

_What did she sense?_ "Do you want to stop and give up on our mission from the gods?" Quel said mock serious.

Saida shook her head, a piece of apple fully occupying space in her left cheek. "Not at all. I'm just saying we need to be more aware of what we are dealing with is all."

"I agree," Quel said. "But until we get closer to our target, this warforged, we will not know anything more specific."

"How do you know we're on the right track?" Flau asked.

Quel smiled happily at that question. "Because the goddess Sharess pointed me to the Elfsong Tavern where all of this began and because I have detected the faintest of scents that I believe is our warforged friend's scent."

"I didn't smell anything," Saida said sourly.

Quel shrugged. "It was more of a feeling than a smell that I got, but whatever it is I can track it. I have a strong feeling we'll find more of it in Zakhara."

Saida remained quiet, looking at Quel with some suspicion; after all she had a nose that she thought was just as strong as his. What could he smell that she couldn't?

"Zakhara," Flau said to herself, nervousness compounded with excitement in her tone of voice.

"Don't worry kid, you'll be fine with us," Saida comforted Flau.

"Zakhara is a land of blistering sands with scant oases It is ruled over by caliphs, with the Grand Caliph in Huzuz being the overlord of them all," explained Quel to Flau and Saida. "Djinns are common in Zakhara too, but hopefully we won't run into any of them."

"To Zakhara we go, full speed ahead, look out below!" Saida sang.

"We're on the trail of something big," Quel said, ignoring the cat-girl and looking at his two companions, some strength returning to him now as he got up from his bed. "Whatever we discover in Zakhara will lead us to our target and the goddesses."

"Whether we're prepared or not," mused Saida.

"Exactly," Quel jokingly agreed.

The wizard they had finally chosen after searching Baldur's Gate for hours didn't exactly look promising. His tower was three stories tall, built out of old bricks and was in the prolonged process of decayed collapse. Large gaps of roofing were missing where the shingles had fallen in and exposed the beams. Scorch marks dotted the outside of the tower at random intervals and the smell of smoke hung heavy in the air, like there was a twenty-four hour grill in the tower, cooking and burning things that shouldn't be cooked and burned.

The door, which was the only way into or out of the tower aside from a few murder holes up higher, had an amazing door knocker in the shape of a snarling ogre made out of rusted and worn brass. The door itself seemed to be constructed of old faded mahogany. From all reports around town this was a reliable wizard decorated with multiple accounts of arcane skill, but from all appearances he looked to be a loon decorated with many things that denoted lunacy.

Saida boldly walked up, grabbed the door knocker and slammed it into the door five times loudly. "Wizard, open up! We have need of your services!"

Before Quel could chastise Saida and try to make her be more respectful towards a wizard the door silently swung inwards, dragging Saida in with it before she had a chance to let go of the door knocker. Right as the door was swinging open she let go of the knocker falling to land on her hands and feet. Her inhuman dexterity very apparent: most people would've fallen flat on their faces in her place.

"Seems cat-girls land on their feet just as well as actual cats," Flau quipped.

"Seems that way," Quel agreed.

"Shut it!" Saida retorted from the floor, voice slightly muffled from her position.

After Saida picked herself up off of the floor and Quel and Flau joined her in the entryway of the tower they were greeted by a young boy in wizardly apprentice robes two sizes too big for his small frame.

"My master is expecting you," he said ominously. "Follow me please."

The entryway was one small unadorned room that had two doorways leading both left and right and the only other passage from that room aside from going back out the front door was to ascend a spiral metal staircase set in the middle of the room. The staircase led up into the everlasting gloom that pervaded the wizard's tower. The boy led them up those stairs three whole floors. They passed many landings with sealed and often times strange doorways. Some seemed to be giant faces with the doors being in the mouth of the leering visage, others looked like cages with strange lights emanating from behind the bars. It was a queer place.

Stopping at the top of the stairs on the final and grandest of the landings the boy gestured at the giant blackened wood door that dominated the landing. "My master awaits you in there," and with that he vanished at a trot down the stairs, his passing leaving no noticeable noise on the stairs.

Saida was almost muttering to herself in angst filled nervousness over the eeriness of this place, her ears folded back over her head, Flau was looking around with equal parts curiosity and fear and Quel was yawning. Flau and Saida traded aghast looks over how calm he looked.

Quel boldly strode forward, taking the lead this time, and pushed open the door after knocking briefly three times. "Hello? We are looking to purchase a teleportation spell for three people, is anyone here?"

"Of course someone is here boy!" replied a grumpy man's voice from within the room. Nasally and deep, the voice rasped from the throat like fingers on chalk. Saida folded her ears back even farther in distaste at the sound of it.

Quel, Saida and Flau entered the room to behold a circular room with many windows boarded shut, small beams of sunlight shining through haphazardly. Stacks of books miles high dotted the floor, tables and any other surface wide and flat enough to accommodate them. Smoke filled and clogged the air near the domed ceiling. The ceiling was a stained glass tapestry , showcasing an odd representation of a well known summer festival where a village's maiden's danced around a maypole, only in this representation the maypole was a giant carrot and the maiden's were giant rabbit's dressed as maiden's.

Standing beyond a row of waist high stacked books was the wizard. He was cooking up something fowl in his cauldron and was coated so much in greasy ash that he was more akin to an emaciated half human, half grey render than an actual normal human male.

He wore no hat, no shoes and no pants. He had on no robe and no clothing to speak of except for one item: a bath towel with what appeared to be a shriveled belt of garlic holding it up.

Saida gave Quel a wide eyed, tight lipped look that was overflowing with anger, incredulity and sheer denial. Quel inched a few minor steps away from Saida before addressing the wizard, trying his best to ignore Flau hiding behind his back, clinging to him slightly.

"Good wizard!" he began too loudly, trying not to laugh or look scared over the lunatic standing in front of him.

"Get on with it boy!" the wizard growled. He had piercing blue eyes and a long flowing beard that reached his toes, every inch of it besmirched with soot and ash. He had enough wrinkles to form a small mountain range and a bald pate with a few curly wisps of hair sticking up like antenna.

"Can you teleport all three of us a very long distance for a small fee?" asked Quel tentatively.

"Of course I can!" the wizard grumped. "I've been transporting people from one corner of Toril to another for longer than you've been breathing young whippersnapper!"

"Quel can we go already!" Saida hiss-whispered, making the old man perk up.

"Hmph!" the old man poked a bony finger with a long unclipped dirty fingernail on it at Saida. "I am not to be trifled with young girl!" he warned. "I am a master on par with Elminster himself!"

Quel lost it. "Elminster!? You!?" he laughed, then forcing composure to return to himself he said calmly, "Prove it," before crossing his arms and assuming a challenging posture, which Flau and Saida caught on to and mimicked.

The old wizard grew furious and jumped up and down stomping his feet making whatever was in his cauldron spill over a small amount, splashing on the floor...and burning a hole straight through it.

"Where do you want to go?" he challenged, suddenly growing smug.

"Zakhara, specifically the Golden City of Huzuz," Quel said clearly and slowly, making sure the old wizard could hear him.

"All three of you? Hmm, alright come closer and stand on this platform."

Quel, walked forwards and with some reluctance Saida and Flau did so as well. They were positioned on a one foot high circular platform, five smaller circles within the perimeter of the platform. Quel, Saida and Flau each picked one and stood at attention.

"Alright it'll be 3,000 gold pieces for each of you and mark my words, that's as cheap a price as you're like to find in Baldur's Gate, if not the entirety of the Sword Coast."

Quel handed the wizard the 9,000 gold coins and gave him a meaningful look. "We're placing trust in you to get us to Zakhara, please don't double cross us. You're not worth the trouble of tracking down and repaying such a betrayal, but I will do it if I have to."

The old wizard grumped again. "Betrayal's not worth the risk young whippersnapper, now mind your feet and elbows and stay perfectly still while I commence with the spell."

"Quel! Are we seriously going to go through with this!?" Saida asked in shocked anger. "With HIM?

Quel sighed, closing his eyes and furrowing his brow. "We have no choice Saida. Time is short and he's the only one who will transport us this cheaply. I'm not made of money," Quel explained all of this not unkindly to Saida, trying to get her to understand that this immense lunatic of a wizard was their best shot given their circumstances. Saida nodded, discontented by his words but understanding their logic. Flau was quiet throughout all of this, apparently not trusting herself to words. The wizard, perpetual glare still in effect, paused to make sure they were all done with their griping before he began.

After some hocus pocus, which consisted of muttering in an unknown language, sprinkling a fine powder around their feet and what seemed needless jumping and screeching that showed off his manhood, making Saida look at him like he was a few parcels short of a full basket and Flau blush and get a bit queasy, the spell was over. Some sort of caustic explosion was occurring behind the wizard, his cauldron having become overwrought by its unfortunes. A fiery wall of vile looking pyroclastic smoke billowed out rapidly, obscuring the wizard as he did his final few cantrips. But with a pop and a blink they disappeared from the nameless wizard's tower in Baldur's Gate and arrived in the Land of Fate, Zakhara.

"This doesn't look like what I thought Zakhara would look like…" Flau said quietly.

"That's because Quel screwed up," Saida said in exasperation, dropping to the ground on her butt.

"I can't argue with that logic," Quel said, resigned. "He probably died in whatever that cauldron was spewing out."

They were standing in a limitless vista of rolling plains. Grasslands undulating in a medium breeze that carried with it the intoxicating scents of the far off unknown. As far as the eye could see there was nothing but the limitless grasslands and the cerulean blue sky in all directions. Flau plopped down on the ground too, mimicking Saida by sitting with her legs stretched out in front of her, leaning back on her arms looking up at the sky.

"Now what?" she asked.

"We keep moving," Quel replied.

"Where though?" Flau continued.

"South," Quel said, monosyllabic.

"You know where we are then?" Saida asked incredulously.

"Nope, just going by my intuition," Quel replied.

"A man is going by his intuition?" Saida said deadpan.

Quel sighed, but remained silent. He started walking south, Saida and then Flau following behind.

"Alright, alright," Saida said. "I'll try to stop giving you shit."

Hours of walking later they still hadn't seen any change in the landscape and nothing caught their eyes on the horizon. Step by step they were making their way south, hours of memory wasted on viewing the dreary land around them.

Finally, after so many hours had passed that the sun was beginning to drift near the western horizon, blazing with celestial intensity and darkness was beginning to flow like a quilt across the sky to the east, something happened.

Saida spoke up, voice filled with a tense awareness. "Did you guys hear that…? It sounded like…a dragon."

Quel paused, straining his ears to catch what Saida had heard and then a few seconds later he heard it too, far off to their left in the growing gloom of the night a dragon had roared.

Flau, clueless, looked from Quel to Saida. "I can't hear anything," she said.

Quel looked at Flau and Saida, nodding. "It's a dragon alright, but do we really want to go towards it?"

"Go towards it!?" Flau exclaimed, appalled.

"Of course we're going towards it," Saida said matter-of-factly, like it was an obvious thing to do.

Flau groaned. "Why did I pick you two to travel the stars with again?" she asked the heavens.

"Because we're good company?" Quel teased.

"Because we can keep you alive in extreme situations?" Saida said.

"You guys head towards extreme situations!" Flau retorted.

"So?" Quel and Saida said together.

"Nothing," Flau said defeated. "Just don't do anything too stupid, okay?" she pleaded.

"Don't worry," Quel said dismissively, making Flau worry.

"Exactly," Saida said cheerily. "We've got your back."

Flau was not comforted by their reassurances, not at all.

Over a mile of plains trekking later and they arrived at the lip of a small bowl shaped depression in the land. In this bowl, which was about a mile wide from the side to the center, there was a fierce battle occurring between a wyvern and four odd centaur like cat-people. They had the upper body of a humanoid and the lower body of a lion, with fur color ranging from golden brown to a blazing orange-golden color on their leader's fur. They carried huge tall shields and long hunting spears which they used to stab the wyvern far out of range of it's claws and stinging tail. They had leonine features on their faces and large manes in place of hair. They wore belts and harnesses, but no clothing. Their leader had a shield with a special crest on it and was slightly larger than his followers.

They fought the wyvern tooth and claw, sometimes leaping in to quickly rake the side of the wyvern with their front claws, but more likely stabbing at it with their spears. The wyvern was bloody and its tail strikes would hit either air or the strong shields of the cat-people, doing little to no harm.

The wyvern finally took off into the air and circled the bowl shaped depression, choosing a cat-person and diving at them with the full might of its bulk. The cat-person would be crushed, even with its brethren so close beside it there was nothing they could do.

Quel saw all of this and created a gust of wind that knocked the wyvern off course, sending it to crash into the side of the lip across from our trio. With a roar of dismay and a deafening crash that kicked up a large plume of dust and dirt, the wyvern "landed." The cat-people galloped to it and poked it with their spears, but it was either out cold or dead. They turned as one to glare in Quel's direction.

"Hail and well met!" Quel said exuberantly.

Saida slapped him on the back of his head and took the lead as he sheepishly stood back. "We are not here to hunt on your land, we only seek passage out of your realm." Saida said loudly and with orator style projection skills. Flau hung back, behind Quel who was rubbing his head.

The cat-people strode/loped forward and regarded Quel, Flau and most of all Saida. They sniffed and gazed at her with slight consternation.

"You are like us, only more…human," their golden orange leader said in his deep solemn voice. "Are you a lycanthrope?"

"No, I'm…another breed of cat." Saida said hesitantly. "Can you help us navigate our way out of this land?"

The leader nodded, his fellow cat-people looming in the night in a half circle around and below Quel, Saida and Flau. Even though they stood below our trio they loomed above them, they must be at least seven feet tall and all of their weight was of muscle, over a good ton of it without a single ounce of fat.

After looking back at his three warriors the leader gazed at Quel, Flau and Saida each in turn, looking into their eyes, piercing the veil of their aloofness and seeing them for what they were.

"I will help you," said the leader. "But you must never return here again. That is my price for helping you."

"Okay," Saida said. "Which way takes us in the direction of Zakhara, if that name is familiar to you?"

"It is not," the leader shook his head on his massive shoulders. "I can take you to a human village. Someone there may know of where you seek to go."

And with that the leader ceased communications and instead began to speak in a language Quel was surprised to hear him speak. He was ordering his followers to surround and guide Quel, Saida and Flau away to the southeast. Quel mulled over what he should do and then decided on a course of action.

"Hail and well met," Quel said in Sylvan, the language that the leader had been speaking. Quel now knew who these cat-people were and was kicking himself that he had almost missed this opportunity. They were wemics, the proud warriors of the plainlands.

The wemic leader stopped and turned to regard Quel intensely. "How do you know our language?" he demanded.

"I am of the Shielders," replied Quel.

The wemic leader snarled, yelling in rage. "You look nothing like a Shielder! You lie!"

"I am the adopted son of one of the chiefs!" yelled back Quel, growing equally fierce.

The wemic leader paused, straightening up to his full height in the moonlight. "Prove it," was all he said. Flau and Saida, unaware of the words being spoken, were watching this discussion with rapt attention.

Quel stood staring at him for a few seconds, a blank expression on his face. _Prove it he says. Alright pussycat, I'll prove it to you. Just don't be disappointed when I do. _Sighing deeply, Quel took a single step back from the wemic chieftain and seemed to grow infinitely more solemn. He undid the belt that he wore around his waist, which served as both his gunbelt and his utility belt with many small pouches around it. Quel held it up high into the night, showing the wemic chieftain the intricate symbols inscribed all around its circumference, particularly one big spooky one. They looked to be in an alphabet Saida did not know of, but she had learned of many alphabets in her time, why not this one? She was perplexed and resolved to ask him about it later on.

"Now do you believe me?" Quel said in a dangerously quiet voice, challenging the wemic chieftain.

The wemic chieftain seemed taken aback and he had to collect himself before he could speak, also taking that time to quiet his suddenly skittish warriors. "I believe you now are the son of the Shielders," he said with the utmost courtesy and decorum. "I will guide you to Shaarmid. There you may find the answers you seek."

It was no easy thing getting out of those plains lands. They were in the vastness of the Shaar, an untamed and largely wild land filled with even wilder people. Eleven days of hard travel later, heading ever east and northward they arrived at Shaarmid and bid a none-teary eyed farewell to the wemic party of four. Saida and Flau now regarded Quel with even more suspicion over how easily he had managed to garner the respect of the wemics, but both of them knew better than to ask. The look alone on his face bespoke of tragedy and neither one of them wanted to bring up anything painful, at least for now anyway.

Shaarmid was a city of free trade and good business. It had sturdy and tall walls that the city's merchants felt secure behind. The local militia patrolled with great frequency, ensuring the continued safety of the city with great enthusiasm. Quel also noticed more than a few guards exacting "protection fees" from the local populace and tried his best to steer Saida and Flau away from those sorts.

They found their way into a local inn, shoddy and ill kempt though it was. They asked the bartender what direction Zakhara was and he laughed in their faces. They asked many people, only to receive laughter or anger for their question. No one wanted to tell them where Zakhara was, which was odd. Finally as they left the shoddy inn they were accosted by an old man in the garb of a Zakharan wayfarer.

"You seek the Land of Fate?" he asked, brown eyes glinting from beneath his face covering.

"Yes," Saida said for all of them.

Nodding his head, the man made sure no one was watching them then gestured for them to follow him into the alley across the street. They did so with much trepidation and Quel and Flau loosened their blades in their sheaths so they would be easier to draw. The man was waiting for them in the depths of the alley, a small smile on his face.

"There is a secret way to the Land of Fate not far from here. It is fraught with peril and death," the man warned sternly. "Are you committed to your path?"

"Yes, we're sure," Quel said.

"One-hundred percent," Saida added.

"Mostly," Flau added.

The man nodded his head, reaching into his billowing robe, pulling out a small piece of carefully folded canvas that he handled with some reverence. "This map will guide you. When you reach the end of the map another guidepost will point you along your way." Handing the map over to them the man seemed to be in a good mood. "Few ever live to tell of where you are going, be careful, be free. Farewell adventurers," and with that he took off at a slow jog deeper into the alley.

Quel looked at the map in the light of a nearby street torch with Saida and Flau standing on either side of him looking over both of his shoulders at the map as well. They surveyed it like that in silence for quite some time, taking in the vast distances on the map and the ancient language written across its surface.

Saida was the first to speak. "This is either going to be a grand adventure or a hellish gauntlet," she mused.

"Hellish gauntlet," Flau predicted.

"It will be grand alright," Quel said bemusedly. "Right up until we get strange and outrageous critters crawling up our breeches. I am not entirely a lover of jungles."

"So, where now?" Saida asked for all of them.

"To the River Shaar!" Quel said exuberantly, folding up the map and pausing to add. "Just as soon as we purchase a small boat…"


	12. 11 Firelit Words

_**Chapter Eleven: Firelit Words **_

**Toril, the River Shaar, October 24th, 1391 a.c.**

They stood at the bridge that crossed over the River Shaar, after two weeks of hard travel east again, this time carrying a big wooden boat. Shaarmid was now a fargone memory or bad dream behind them. Quel had purchased a small canoe with his quickly deteriorating funds. It was big enough for four humans and a halfling, or three orcs and a dwarf (never mind the fact that the orcs and dwarf would be doing their best to kill each other). Quel had carried the canoe with Saida and Flau's help the entire way here, getting constant grumpiness from his travel mates for the issue of the boat. He had to admit, his plans were not half assed-they were fully assed ventures.

All three of them had lost any fat they had once had and were lean, mean, scary looking fighting machines. They weren't emaciated, but they were lean in every sense of the word. The supplies Quel had purchased in Shaarmid would last them for two months at the current rate they were all eating, which meant their packs were super heavy and along with the weight of the boat they were carrying, made their lives a heavy slow toil each day. Quel and particularly Saida, being both stronger than Flau were in better shape carrying the boat, but Flau was really being forced to excel for her survival.

As they launched the boat and struck off down the river with Quel paddling for all of them Saida started up a conversation. "You know Quel," she began, catching his attention. "You aren't the best traveling company and you do sometimes make things more difficult than they have to be, but you do know how to intrigue a girl with your own mystery."

Quel remained silent, seemingly ignoring Saida, but she knew he was listening to her every word.

"I mean it was quite a surprise to see you get the help of those bird people and then these cat people." She stopped talking normally and put a little steel into her next words. "You know a lot of languages and you have the respect, even fear of two distinct races on this world, just who are you?" she demanded.

Quel had pain in his eyes as he looked at her to answer, Flau a silent witness to their conversation. "I am no one," he said softly. "I am the last of my people, sworn to avenge them. I will tell you no more at the moment Saida and Flau. If you do not wish to travel with me anymore I will summon my ship to us and we will escape this world, breaking multiple laws and regulations in the process and the trust of a goddess or two. Choose: stay, or go?"

Saida sighed in disgust. "When you put it that way I won't leave you, not yet anyway. You seem to be a gentle enough guy Quel I'll stick around a bit longer."

"I don't want to go anywhere," Flau added, "Even with all of my whining."

He gazed at them, finally smiling sardonically. "Thank you both."

"You're welcome crazy leader," Flau said. They both saluted.

After that they each retreated into their own thoughts, miles passing by much more quickly and sleepily aboard a boat.

Time passed in a blur. The River Shaar was long and it gave way to Lake Lesphen, a salty body of water that had salt encrusted shores and was unsuitable for anything but mineral collection. From the River Shaar to Lake Lesphen and across the lake itself they arrived at another river flowing south. The map had no name for this river, but it led them into a forest that had two forks in the river, Quel chose the right-hand one that was marked as the River Talar. They quickly left behind the small wood and passed out onto the plainlands again, with mountains to their right marked as the Wyrmbone Mountains. To their left was nothing but open scrubland.

The days passed quickly, each of them enjoying the other's company and getting along splendidly. The River Talar then bent up northwest a bit and flowed slightly towards the Wyrmbone Mountains and before long they saw a wall of green in front of them. The map marked this place as the Misty Vale and had a mark almost halfway into the middle of it as their destination.

They were in good spirits as they headed into the thick jungle known as the Misty Vale. They knew not its dire reputation, nor of its grim history. They especially did not know of what lurked in that jungle. Of the ancient history of the cursed and forgotten elf tribe who slew all who dared enter their jungle, with poisonous darts that killed almost instantly, but not mercifully. They were not prepared for what awaited them in its depths.

They made camp outside the borders of the jungle for their last night out in the open. They all sat around a small campfire that Saida had built with gathered dead flotsam and jetsam of the forest. Dinner had consisted of the fish Quel and Flau had caught, though Flau had just helped to carry them ashore. Flau was nodding off and then snoring lightly between Quel and Saida. The two of them gazed dreamily at the night sky, a forest of single stars, constellations and nebula visible above them.

"You know," Quel began quietly. "I didn't know you knew how to make a fire."

"It comes with the territory," she said drowsily.

"What territory?" he asked just as sleepily, not able to control himself from asking a question any longer.

"Being a special forces operative," she said quietly, growing solemn. "I know you never asked about my past and I've been rude about asking you about yours. Do you want to hear a little bit about it now, as a fair trade?"

"Of course," he said sitting up and coming awake. His movements made Saida rouse herself too.

"Thanks," she smiled and then grew serious again. "I was a special forces operative in the Ctarl Ctarl Empire, one of the elite few who got to join the top secret Order of Ancestral Homeland Defense." She grew quiet, recalling her former life. Quel reached across the sleeping form of Flau and squeezed her hand once gently before pulling away. She looked up at him and smiled. In the light of the fire her radiant eyes sparkled majestically and made Quel's heart rate increased ever so slightly.

Saida continued. "We got all of the missions that were labeled as 'impossible' for the other departments. We handled anything that threatened our empire's borders. Terrorism, rebellion, hostage situations, spying, reconnaissance and assassinations, to name a few. Anything that was thought could encroach upon the stability of the border was our domain." She petered off into silence, obviously not wanting to go into more detail.

"No need to continue Saida, I can understand your past now."

She looked at him almost as if pleading for help, but too proud to ask for it. Of course none of this was in her posture or her expression; she was as cool as a cucumber in every way except for her eyes. They were infinitely sad and beginning to fog up with unshed moisture. Or he was seeing things that weren't there, which made more sense.

"I want to share something of myself with you too Saida," he said hesitantly.

She waited with bated breath, her interest undeniable. Quel almost wanted to chuckle over her posture, but he didn't want to offend her so he reigned in his emotions and composed his thoughts for what he wanted to tell her.

"My name is Quel Tiin and as odd as that name sounds the way I got it is even more so. You see I nearly died when I was ten years old in a terrible accident. That was when they found me, nearly dead from starvation and dehydration, wandering in the middle of the wilderness on my home world. _They_ were the Kestävä race. They took me in and finished raising me, instilling in me their ways and creed. And giving me my name" Quel grabbed his belt. "This belt is a tradition of theirs. It's a recording of my entire life and I will inscribe the important events in my life on it up until the day I die.

"Well, I unzipped my lips for once," he remarked sardonically. "It'll be awhile before I nerve up to do that again."

"You shared," she said softly. "It's good enough for now."

They looked at each other for a moment and then each lay back down to sleep, their shared revelations over for the moment. Trust was hard to come by, but the first layer of the onion was now effectively peeled back.

Quel closed his eyes, drifting off where his sleepy mind would take him. He lost track of time and was daydreaming about pumpkin pie when he heard a shuffling sound and opened his eyes to see Saida leaning over him. His heart rate skyrocketed, snapping him fully awake. She was leaning in with her eyes half closed for a kiss, taking her time to close the gap between their mouths and relishing the moment as much as he was. She smelled amazing and had the cutest half smile on her sleepy face he had ever seen. Without much thinking he half closed his eyes and leaned up to close the gap. Their lips brushed...

And then Flau woke up with a start, bolting upwards in a flash and surprising them both. Saida fell backwards on her derriere in her haste to get up. Quel leaned up on his elbows, too surprised to react.

"I had the most horrible nightmare!" Flau exclaimed, not yet fully awake and breathing slightly faster than usual. Then she looked around and saw the way Quel and Saida were looking at her as well as the way they were positioned. She took in their disheveled appearance, blushing faces and fast breathing and put too much of her imagination into what she saw.

"Oh-ho!?" she teased, yawning. "Sorry I intruded on your lover's moment."

"Shut it Flau," Saida said also teasing, though it was hard to tell at first.

Quel remained silent and as he caught Saida's eye he knew their relationship would be different from now on. The gulf between them had been bridged. He was beginning to understand the mystery that was Saida. He knew her anger was mostly self directed and while he didn't yet understand why that was so he knew in time all would be revealed. Patience was a virtue after all.

For now he had to figure out if it was such an amazing thing to be getting close to her, or if it was actually a not so amazing thing.

The jungle was nearly pitch black under the canopy. Thankfully they were entering it by way of the river and wouldn't have to suffer being in the darkness like that. The trees were immensely tall and vine and moss covered. It was humid and damp within that forest, a stark contrast to the plainlands of the Shaar to the north. The river was wide and they stayed to the center as they traversed downstream.

Odd ululations and cries echoed from the jungle. Birds of vibrant color and plumage dotted the canopy overhead, singing in their avian language songs as old as time. The river was filled with exotic fish and Saida had to restrain herself from trying to fish them out as some of them were carnivorous and if that wasn't enough of a deterrent there were also occasional crocodiles swimming lazily through the river, each one easily two times the size of their small canoe. Saida obliquely glanced at them, still debating the virtues of fishing this river. Quel caught her eye, giving her a look like she was nuts and that was finally enough to stop her from foolishly fishing in these waters.

Paddling rotated between all three of them and it was Flau's turn to row when they started to notice the river was beginning to clog up with vines in places and gloom was taking dominance over the light of the sun overhead. Looking up they saw the canopy had an intricate web of vines slowly growing denser. Dimness, gloominess and darkness were becoming ever present in this muggy land.

Quel took up position at the front of the canoe and began to hack apart the vines in their way. Every once in awhile he'd encounter a particularly large insect or arachnid glaring at him from the vines he was cutting and he'd freak out, almost screaming like a little girl. Saida finally couldn't take his shenanigans anymore and grumbled about his jackass behavior as she grabbed his cutlass and began hacking at the vines more viciously than he had been doing so. When a spider or bug landed on her she would simply brush it off before it had a chance to think about what it wanted to bite.

Their progress was slower because of the vines, but not as slow as it had been when Quel was at the helm. They still continued into the ever darker jungle, the sounds becoming fainter and more sinister. As Saida was hacking away at the newest collection of vines Quel saw them shiver and tried to warn her, but she was already backing away and it was already too late anyway. The vines shot out and grabbed her around the throat, or at least they tried to. She used Quel's cutlass expertly, slicing two of the vines off and blocking the third, on the blade, where it quickly latched on and pulled it from her grasp, almost taking Saida with it and upsetting the canoe.

Then six more vines shot out of the darkness and began to strangle Saida even as she ripped them apart. Flau was panicking in the back of the canoe. Quel handed her the paddle and casted a minor Kidō spell to save Saida.

Aiming at the source of the deadly vines up in the trees Quel cried out his incantation: "Hadō #54. Haien!" As he cried out and waved his arm quickly in the direction of the plant a purple streak of light shot out of his hand and collided with the plant, incinerating it completely and erasing it from existence. The vines around Saida's throat and upper torso caught fire and turned to nothing in quick succession, leaving her unscathed. Quel stood at the prow of the canoe and caught her as she fell back down to earth. The canoe almost overturning from the sudden weight returning to it.

"Thanks," she said simply, a smile on her face.

"You're welcome," Quel replied, also smiling.

Their faces were very close and they were taking in the scent of one another. Suddenly their mood was broken by a young girl clearing her throat behind them.

"Can we continue with our journey now please?" Flau asked from the opposite side of the canoe. "Some of us have better things to do than ogle each other."

Saida resumed cutting her way through the vines, Quel's _Durandal_ sword having been easily retrieved from where it had been lodged in the vines overhead when the evil plant had incinerated. This time she hacked slightly more cautiously, though she continued to ignore and brush off the wide variety of weird insects and spiders this jungle produced. The majority of them being too big for Quel's comfort. They stopped for their first night within the jungle docked in the center of the river. They lit no fire and ate a cold meal for supper. They each took five hour turns watching for danger in the impenetrable gloom of the jungle. First Flau, then Quel and finally Saida took turns watching. Nothing happened on that first night and they rose early to start again, this time Flau took up Quel's sword and began hacking at the undergrowth as Saida snoozed under a blanket in the middle of the canoe, while Quel rowed from the rear.

As it always does in tedious situations, time seemed to stop. Their progress felt infinitesimally slow. The day came and went with their progress being about a mile. Flau was all tuckered out from her ordeal with having to cut and hack and slash at so much greenery all day. They docked in the middle of the river again and ate a cold meal again. They could feel the aura in the air growing somehow denser and knew it was probably because they were getting nearer to the jungle's core. Somehow they fell asleep without posting anyone to watch. Nothing bad came about because of this, though they didn't have anyone watching their backs in the night.

They awoke the next morning to discover thousands of gossamer threads overlapping the air a dozen feet above them. The sky was literally covered by the threads, blocking out the sky. The morning light blazed on the threads because dew had gathered on them in the night, making them blaze with morning light.

"Don't touch them," Quel said needlessly. Only spiders make webs and there was so much webbing that it was either a ton of largish spiders or one giant spider with a small abdomen. They continued on, deeper into the jungle, more wary now than they had been and that was saying something.

This time Quel took over hacking and slashing and he let Saida take over rowing. Their progress increased more so than it had been. Mostly this was thanks to Quel's affinity with his sword as Flau was more familiar with daggers and Saida was more familiar with her fists and feet.

They were surrounded in a quiet bubble and they were at peace. The jungle was raucous with the sounds of its wildlife, with many of the sounds sounding so foreign and alien Quel, Saida and Flau looked at the impenetrable wall of foliage with wonder and a little worry.

Finally after two days worth of bushwhacking they cut their way out of the overhanging foliage to find themselves out in a river that quickly began to open up, the shores spreading farther and farther apart. They finally got their first good glimpse of the sky and found it alien to their eyes. It was somehow different, greener somehow. They traveled like this for hours, Quel checking the map to make sure they didn't pass the marker they were looking for.

After several hours on the river, when the sun was receding beyond the curve of the world and shadows were laying claim to the land, they found what they were looking for. It was an unmistakable feature to the land that was represented quite well on their map: a rock outcropping on the right-hand side of the river that looked exactly like a jagged fang protruding from the ground.

It shot up and curved slightly, making it look exactly like a fang carved in stone, though no signs of stone cutting tools were apparent on it. It looked like a completely natural, though bizarre, rock formation and it was such a big outcropping of rock that it looked like a mini mountain from afar. As they got closer they saw how truly small it actually was. On the map the outcropping was called the Sentinel Fang. How original.

They broke up their canoe, shattering it into many small pieces, all of which they hid in the underbrush near the outcropping. They had been lucky so far to not encounter the elves that lived in this jungle. If they did encounter them it would be a fight to the death, because the elves that lived in this jungle had betrayed their kin in the long ago Crown Wars and had retired to the heart of this jungle as penance and to hide their guilt. Of course our intrepid heroes knew nothing of this and the knowledge would likely only have troubled them anyway.

Luckily they didn't encounter any of the elves and their destination loomed in front of them.

"Back into the depths of the earth," said Quel.

"Peachy," said Saida sarcastically.

"How long are we going to be underground?" asked Flau.

Looking at the map Quel traced their path on it, showing Flau and Saida the vast distances they still had to travel.

"We'll be dead of old age before we get there!" Flau said.

"If we don't encounter something tough enough to kill us first," Saida added morosely.

"Calm down you two," Quel said. "My offer still stands if you want to leave."

Both Saida and Flau shook their heads. They wouldn't back out yet.

Quel got out the three torches he was carrying in his pack and lit them one by one. After that they followed him into the depths of the large cave opening in the side of the fang-like outcropping. He hacked off and cut away the wall of ivy and vines that had been blocking the cave mouth, creating a path that Saida and Flau easily followed. The greenery was surprisingly dense and Quel had to cut his way through it for a good ten minutes until the dead growth that had been covered up by the younger, newer and stronger foliage fell away to stagnant but open air.

Their torches shed a good sphere of light as they walked down into the depths, the cave growing ever narrower and claustrophobic. Into the deep once more where echoes could spell a monster creeping up on you or a rock slide from miles away that had traveled far in its death cries. There was no such thing as being too wary in the Underdark. Once more Quel led them on a journey deeper into its depths where they hoped to somehow reach Zakhara by an forgotten and likely insane way.

Two weeks into the Underdark and they had traversed a good hundred miles of meandering, foreign and dangerous terrain. They had passed two fungus forests already and one bubbling and steamy underground lake. The temperatures were always stifling. So far the worst they had encountered in the monster department was a hook horror that Quel had cut in half with one swing of his zanpakuto. Their journey had been uneventful. In fact it had been so uneventful Quel was sure something bad was going to happen in the near future and he could tell his companions felt the same way. They all didn't want to say anything for fear of jinxing themselves, but they were still all thinking the same thing: it had been far too easy.

They had traveled a long way and after going through different zones in the Underdark they knew they were somewhere altogether different from the ones before. It was too quiet, deafeningly so. They were miles underground and being surface dwellers the feeling of having the weight of so much earth above them was unnerving to say the least.

The attack came out of nowhere, with no chance to prepare for it. Suddenly ripples of energy sparkled into the shapes of doors and alien creatures stepped forth from the dimensional portals. It was impossible to mistake their attackers for anything else but ilithids. They had gray slimy skin, tentacled heads and flowing black robes. One of them was different in its appearance, having slightly purple tinged skin, two tentacles far longer than the others around them and an air of arrogance that far surpassed the other ilithids. Quel knew immediately it was the boss and far stronger than the others.

Before Quel could even begin to resist he was assaulted with at least five shock waves of mental force projected from the ilithid's minds.

_Fwoop! Fwoop! Fwoop!_

His body wouldn't respond as he willed it to and then his ability to think simply vanished, snuffed out and leaving him staring blankly at nothing and no one. He fell into darkness hearing Saida and Flau collapse next to him.

They were at the mercy of mind flayers, some of the most evil and vile beings in the known multiverse. Things couldn't get much worse than this, could they?


	13. 12 Broken Cages

_**Chapter Twelve: Broken Cages**_

**Toril, Vi'schruk, November 25th, 1391 a.c.**

Mind flayers, or as they called themselves illithids, were a race of ultimately evil beings who fed on fear and terror like most humans fed on corn and wheat. They dominated anyone who was non-illithid and weak enough to fall on their mercy. They had no mercy to begin with. Mind flayers controlled anyone and anything unfortunate enough to wander into their clutches and had a galactic reputation for slavery and a hunger for brain matter. Mind flayers actually fed on brains, so their name was well deserved.

Vi'schruk was an illithid settlement underneath the Great Sea just off the coast of Dambrath about fifty miles to the southeast of the Bay of Dancing Dolphins. It was a community of illithids older than most and it had an unusually high number of illithids residing in it, some 6,360 mind flayers and their 43,000 slaves, whereas most illithid communities consisted of at most 3,000 illithids and 12,000 slaves. Vi'schruk was an industrious city by illithid standards and it was powerful. Vi'schruk had three ulitharids residing in their community. They were known as the Three Archons of Vi'schruk and their word was second only to the elder brain's. They were one step away from godhood in the illithid community and they flaunted it.

All mind flayers were prideful, but these three ulitharids, being possessed of stronger psionic abilities and greater strength and ability in general, were a step above other illithids pride. Entitled by their inherent rights, the ulitharids ruled with iron fists on the large community of Vi'schruk.

Vi'schruk's geographic location also lent it strength and near impregnability. It was built into a cliffside in a vast and unexplored underground chasm. This large pitch black cavern lay a mile underneath the sea floor and was as oppressively silent as it was vast. If the illithids paused to consider the implications of their illuminated city casting light into an abyss that had probably never even seen a glimmer they would have thought better than to build their community there, but caution didn't even enter their minds once.

Vi'schruk was built far back into the cave wall with many different corridors, halls and buildings arrayed in a labyrinth of carved tunnels and natural caverns. Here was where most of the community dwelled, but the select few who were allowed to live near the elder brain resided in the garish and daunting tower built out and above the vast chasm. The tower was suspended partly by psionic power and mostly by reinforced beams of molded stone and metal that anchored it into the cave wall. It was here that the Three Archons lived with around 200 other illithids in thrall to their and the elder brain's whims. It was the only tower built in the entire community and the only part of the community that stuck out of the cavern wall.

Quel, Saida and Flau were just another three slaves added to the mix, blending in with all of the other mindless thralls. Not that they were intentionally blending in. Individuality was not allowed in an illithid community, where the beings in charge were so inherently evil individuality would have served as a quick way to attract a death notice anyway.

Saida and Flau had been put in a holding room with other men, women and children who were all going to be sold into slavery. Saida and Flau were probably going to be sold to some Underdark lord and put into a harem. Quel, being handsome but not nubile and possessed of great physical ability was placed in the gladiatorial rings every illithid community had. He had been auctioned off to the highest bidder and was currently earning his master many trophies and prizes with his victories.

All three had their minds controlled by the insidious mind flayers around them. Absolute control with no exceptions. Robbed of their individuality and free will they were little better than puppets in their own twisted play. It would take a miracle for any of them to escape Vi'schruk alive, let alone all three of them. Flau had garnered no special attention beyond the illithids noting her physical attractiveness to others of her species. Saida was a bit of a commodity and many illithids did the illithid version of clamoring to get a look at her.

Clamoring in their species was what humans called a small peaceful crowd. That was the one and only time an illithid could be described as peaceful. Only when viewing something rare and odd by their standards would they assume an expression of repose. But it had to be properly subdued for this to happen, so peaceful came with a measure of dominance which could also be construed as arrogance. Take your pick.

Quel earned the most attention of the recently captured slaves. His sword was examined by nearly every illithid within the community of Vi'schruk and they poked and prodded at his belongings, a barely remembered sensation coloring all of their senses as they picked through his belongings. None of them could remember who the Kestävä were, but their ancient instincts did. An uneasy feeling permeated the very farthest reaches of their psyches when they got too close to him for extended periods of time. The Kestävä tribe had tried their best to eradicate mind flayers after all, but had given up the cause in favor of combatting more widespread evils, like the Hora-Quan. What really captivated the mind flayers was the mark on Quel's stomach.

Many events were about to take place in that dark city beneath the surface of Toril where the sun had never shone.

Quel stood in the middle of a blood soaked arena, his most recent foe lay dead on the field in front of him. It was an old bugbear that had grown too old to fight at it's prime, so it had fallen before his skill with the blade. Not that he possessed even half of his full skill as the illithid's kept him as brain dead as possible, only allowing a modicum of his potential to leak through their vice-like grip on his mind.

Quel was unaware of his deeds and only had the basest perception of pleasing his master and following his every thought and word with the utmost obedience. He had just earned his master another prize in the long string of his victories. His master was almost jubilant with his glee over the riches his new gladiator was slowly, but surely earning him. Roars of approval and denial were slowly dying down as Quel was telepathically told to exit the arena and return to his holding pen. Another day done in the long list of similar tedious days serving the illithid community. If Quel was actually conscious to his daily life during that time he would have been full of boredom and frustration. Walking along the dimly lit and cramped servant's corridor Quel shuffled mindlessly into his cramped yet comfortable cell and scarfed down his most recent meal of gruel that was thankfully tasteless.

Inside the fiber of Quel's being a struggle was taking place. While the mind flayers did take special notice of Quel's strength and could clearly see his abilities were unique and different from what they had previously heard of they could not disassemble the mystery that was Quel's zanpakuto. It baffled them. Even now they continued to cast spells of divination of every kind on it to no end. Quel's mind had been substantially hard to tame and they had nearly broken him before he yielded to their mental commands. But what they did not understand was that inside of Quel his zanpakuto's core and the spirit that gave it physical form was subverting the Mind Flayer's control. His own soul was rebelling against their intrusions.

Today was the day everything came to a head and come what may, the violation of his mind would be put to an end, one way or another.

Inside of Quel there existed a special world, his inner world, where his zanpakuto resided. This world was, if you could believe it, the manifestation of Quel's soul into a physical environment. It was a limitless expanse, like all inner worlds of zanpakuto's, and it was in a word: verdant. Endless rolling fjords as tall as mountains spread to the horizon with deep bodies of water flowing between them. Grass grew on top of the fjords and waved in an endless breeze that cooled and invigorated the world. This was no ordinary grass, for it shone like a rainbow, with mainly purples and blues and greens and a few yellows shining forth from its lustrous form. The grass was magic to the eyes. Tall waterfalls cascaded from some of the fjords, flowing down into the endless deep of the water. The water flowed in no apparent direction, with many currents meeting together, but no whirlpools. Except in one place at what could be considered the heart of this realm.

There lay one monstrous and terrifying whirlpool the size of a small lake that could reasonably be compared to the legend of Charybdis. Blackness like the void of a black hole lay at the center of that whirlpool. This whirlpool was at the bottom of a particularly tall fjord that had a fine view of the countryside. Upon the top of this fjord, on a plateau of land, stood a giant white wolf. He had dog-like aspects, but he was a wolf in full measure. He was twelve feet tall at his full height and his presence made him seem larger. His fur was a pure snow white, unpolluted by color and it almost blazed with an inner light of it's own. His light blue eyes had a deepness to them that pierced whatever he looked at, so fierce was his will. His mind, as keen as a lightsaber, was keeping the mind flayer's advances at bay.

His name was Kaze no Koe and he was the spiritual manifestation of Quel's zanpakuto. His many long weeks of battling the Mind Flayers was about to pay off. He would force a way into the center of Quel's consciousness and force him awake. The hour had finally arrived.

Without turning to look Koe spoke aloud. "Come out. It's time to bring him back."

Moments passed in silence with nothing happening, then Koe's shadow writhed and coalesced into the form of a black wolf with white eyes like a blind man's, but they shined like liquid silver, somehow frightening to look upon. "Why should I bother helping him? He got himself into this mess. This is my best chance to seize control of this body for myself."

Koe looked at his shadow. "You and I both know it's impossible to take control of this body the way it is now."

They simply stared at one another for a time until the shadow wolf sighed in defeat. This shadow wolf called himself Kuro Koe, or Black Voice. He was the antithesis of Kaze no Koe. They were the wolves of love and hate and they stood opposite each other and together within Quel.

"Alright, let's do this then," Kuro Koe said without preamble.

Flowing out of Koe's shadow to become fully formed, Kuro Koe stood on his paws waiting next to Koe. He was every bit as big as Koe and his fur coat shone with a glittering dark luster. Together they raised their heads and howled into the stillness of their inner world. Their combined howls reverberated throughout Quel's soul and body, making him vibrate at another frequency and intruding on the corrosive vibrations that a mind flayer's telepathy produced.

Out of that inner world, in the darkness of the illithid community, all at once Quel woke up in his drab cell, sitting on his sparse pallet. He sat in shock for a few minutes, recollecting where he was and what had happened before he gathered his resolve and prepared for what was to come. Being fully aware in his own body after weeks on end of not being cognizant was dizzying at first for him. He stood on legs that he intimately felt every sensation in, even the flow of his own blood. Then he snapped back to reality and the extreme gravity and bleakness of his situation. He knew Koe and possibly even Kuro Koe had helped to awaken him and he would not fail to use the opportunity those two facets of his identity and being had bought him.

Gathering his reiatsu, Quel pointed at the door and cast a Kidō spell: "_Ye lord! Mask of flesh and bone, flutter of wings, ye who bears the name of Man! Truth and temperance, upon this sinless wall of dreams unleash but slightly the wrath of your claws, Hadō #33. Sōkatsui!"_

A wave of blue energy was fired from Quel's palm, which he had pointed at his cell door. The blue energy blast destroyed his door, reducing it to cinders, and a good portion of the wall around it, the rooms across the corridor and a large portion of the floor and ceiling in that area. Subtlety was out the window.

Quel dashed down the corridor towards what he recalled was the arena exit. He got down the corridor and up two staircases, down another long corridor and out into the main entry hall before he encountered anyone and unfortunately he encountered a pair of illithids and four of their slaves following them in attendance. The slaves were all human men of varying ages and the illithids were both normal, no ulitharids for Quel to worry about. He sighed in relief until the illithids saw him a split second later and fired a barrage of mental cones of energy at him.

_Fwoop! Fwoop! Fwoop! _

Quel leaped high in the air, using his reiatsu to "step" on the air and float above the illithids before using a sonido to teleport behind them. Confused at his display of agility and seeming teleportation magic without any catalysts or incantation, the illithids were turning every which way trying to locate him. His prey was just turning in his direction when he slammed his elbow into the back of it's head, knocking it out in one blow and probably killing it.

"Enzuigiri!" Quel cried out, before using another sonido to teleport behind the other illithid, who had just spun about to see his cohort falling limp to the ground. Quel elbowed him to the back of the head too, before continuing out of the arena building. A cold fury was gripping him, just like countless beings before him who had been freed of their mind flayer's captivity had experienced. The violation to one's mind almost always deeply enraged any being.

Stepping out into the main illithid community Quel found himself in one of the largest chambers set back into the cliff wall, but he didn't know about the cliff yet. All he thought was that it was one big cavern. And it was, standing at a good two-hundred feet and being a giant oval reaching five-hundred feet from one end to the other. It was bowl shaped too, so it was like the inside of a giant odd rocky egg. Buildings, exquisitely carved from stone, lined the walls and were even built into the walls with walkways and balconies. No walkway or building bridged the expansive gap in the middle of the room, they all hung back along the rim of the room.

The decor was of secondary importance to Quel as he spotted and was spotted by dozens of illithids within seconds. Each illithid had at least two slaves in attendance of it and as many as seven, all doing various tasks for their masters like carrying things for them, fanning them, or simply following them. As the illithids saw Quel their slaves would halt in mid action, so that an expanding wave of stopping slaves flowed out from where Quel stood with the evil glint of illithid eyes as an accompanying feature. They immediately saw and felt his state of above brain-deadness and a hailstorm of mental cones of mind numbing energy flew at him like a wall.

_FWOOOOOOP!_

Quel almost chuckled when he simply use a sonido to appear across the egg shaped room at the entrance to a long corridor away from the room. He quickly ducked through it and ran as fast as he could away from the illithids. They were in an uproar, unable to understand where he had gone. They spread out to search for him and he knew they would be at the end of the corridor he was running down. They were like a hive mind after all, to avoid one you had to avoid all of them.

Quel was already forming a plan for revenge and for that to succeed he needed to find the elder brain of the community. From what little he knew of mind flayers he guessed it would no doubt be under heavy guard.

Up at the top of the daunting tower was a room belonging to one of the Three Archons of Vi'schruk. The eldest of the Three, who was also the most cruel and the strongest of them all, lived here part time. This room was special in that it was both a laboratory and a trophy room. Along the walls hung artifacts and creatures from all across Toril and the astral realms beyond. The entire size of the collection was baffling and daunting to look at, which was one of the main reasons Z'Thurun kept it.

Items ranging from beholder eyes preserved in glass jars, to behemoth tusks from Chult, to a shield made out of tanned umber hulk hide. It was a display of raw and indiscriminate power. Z'Thurun was not old for his species, but he wasn't entirely young either. Z'Thurun was admiring his newest collection: Quel's zanpakuto. He of course didn't know the true power of the sword he so coveted and he wasn't the first, nor probably the last to covet the blade so.

He paused in his examination of the sword when he felt the growing concern his brethren were conveying through the shared psychic net that they all used in Vi'schruk. He felt the briefest sensation of worry deep down in the back of his mind, but brushed it aside as nothing without even realizing he did so. What did an almighty ulitharid, the envy and pride of any illithid community have to fear from one unarmed, unaided human male? Z'Thurun sent out a telepathic message to the community, letting everyone know that he wanted this pathetic human for himself. He was going to allow the fool to come to him.

Quel was breathing hard as he ran through the many twisting corridors of the mind flayer city. He didn't even have time to pause and think things through. All he knew was that Saida and Flau were separated from him, hopefully they were still here and not sold off to some other underground warren of evil doers. Every second Quel ran he had to dodge up into the air, using his reiatsu to momentarily kick off of the air itself, or a sonido to teleport somewhere unexpected. The mind flayers were everywhere, multiple cones of mind numbing energy flying at him every second. It was a miracle he had made it this far. They were doing all they could to capture him and his continued swiftness frustrated their efforts.

They used dimensional doors to appear out of nowhere in front of him, firing their mind numbing blasts, missing him by degrees and making his clothes or hair ruffle at every close call. They floated in hidden nooks to ambush him, but he saw through each ambush or was saved by luck every time. They flew after him like a nightmarish horde of tentacled giant locusts. The creepiest part of this whole ordeal was their complete silence. They communicated entirely through telepathy and the only sounds they made were superficial ones: the rustling of clothes and the _fwoop!_ sound of mind blasts.

As Quel dodged through another ill conceived ambush he felt a slight breeze and saw a large doorway overlooking nothingness on the opposite side of a large hall. He almost paid the ultimate price by walking out onto the open floor of the hall and literally threw himself backwards to avoid the twenty plus mind blasts that impacted where he had just occupied space.

An assault squadron of mind flayers hovered in the air before him, their invisibility spells now cancelled out by their attack. Quel didn't have time for this new setback. He spied three mind flayers clutching wands in their slimy, four-fingered hands. It would be very easy to be overwhelmed here if he wasn't careful. Thinking very quickly he fired a Kidō spell at the mind flayers assembled before him without an incantation, so it lacked any strong impulse, but it was quick and it did it's job. All he did was point his index and middle fingers at the mind flayers and then their arms contorted oddly, invisible restraints now binding their arms behind them. They could still look at him head on, firing their brain numbing energy cones.

But Quel had mainly been aiming at the wizards. He was unconcerned about every other danger these mind flayers posed. Using a sonido to teleport, Quel jumped from the entrance to the hall out onto a balcony that overlooked the immense abyss outside of the mind flayer community. He barely paused to survey his surroundings, noting the sheer pitch blackness on his right, the door back the way he came and the spiral staircase to his left heading up around the tower. He ran up the stairs three at a time.

His pursuers arrived in the hall he had just left and encountered their bakudo ensnared cohorts writhing about in the air, flotation spells still in effect. They quickly deduced where he had gone and set up another ambush for him. Gathering together half of their number they created dimensional doorways to various locations outside the tower and began sending their pursuit force through with flying spells enacted.

Quel soon found himself dodging multiple cones of energy coming from his right by a rapidly growing number of mind flayers, they were quickly becoming a swarm. Even after the long erratic chase across the mind flayer city Quel's anger hadn't abated, far from it. As he climbed up the stairs, leaping onto the air and using intermittent sonidos to stay barely one step ahead of his pursuers, Quel had his temper boil over. He began to cast a devastating and powerful Kidō spell, but it cost him. His concentration waned and the mind numbing blasts slowly encroached on him, each one getting closer and closer. The mind flayers sensed the kill and closed in, but he had been muttering all the while. A spell issued forth from his lips and it laid low all of his aggressors in one fell swoop:

"_Ye lord! Mask of blood and flesh, all creation, flutter of wings, ye who bears the name of Man! On the wall of blue flame, inscribe a twin lotus. In the abyss of conflagration, wait at the far heavens, Hadō #73. __**Sōren Sōkatsui!"**_

Ending with a roar, Quel's upraised hands, locked together, unleashed upon the mind flayers a colossal wave of destructive blue spiritual energy. Those mind flayers that weren't burned to death were sent flying for many yards through the air by the shock wave. The flash of light in such a dark place was like the fury of ten-thousand suns and it reduced even Quel to a momentary stupor, but he recovered more quickly than the mind flayers, unaccustomed as they were to light.

Rubbing his eyes, he ran on.

Z'Thurun felt the agony of his fellow brainmates as they expired in pain and shock. He felt keenly their surprise, their anger and their fear. Such things were easily enough conveyed through the grapevine that was a psychic network. He also felt and heard the large blast of energy caused by the interloper's unknown spell. This was getting both worrisome and exhilarating. How long had it been since Z'Thurun had felt this kind of determination from a living being. His brain would taste exquisite and it would be all the better for the palpable taste of sorrow mixed with fear. Z'Thurun had no idea that he should be watching his newest collection. He paid it no mind. He was unable to sense the emanations of energy coming from it as it began to vibrate and then shake. He was lost in his daydreams of a meal to come. The soul cutter was beginning to shake violently, but the ulitharid was too distracted to notice.

Quel was now in desperate straights. He guessed it had only been about fifteen, or at most twenty minutes since his explosive escape from his cell. They had been some of the most painful and agonizing minutes of his life. The sheer mental and physical exhaustion was draining all of his energy and even his body's reserves were beginning to deplete. Waves of dizziness began to assault him, wearing down his ability to think clearly. As he reached the middle of the tower he noticed his pursuers fall behind and vanish. Things got eerily quiet after that. Not trusting this for a minute, Quel spread his senses out and detected no spiritual emanations below or above him, which he didn't think meant much anyway. He couldn't sense psionic energy, so he highly doubted what his senses told him.

He had no choice but to continue. His progress was not interrupted and he made good time. Breathing heavily, sweating and feeling faint, Quel arrived at the top of the tower where his path entered the tower through a small side door. Stepping through this door he discovered he was in a room that had a glass floor looking down on the community's elder brain a dozen stories below. Pausing to look down at the giant bulbous and disgusting mass of brain matter, Quel looked forwards at the spiral staircase also made out of the same glass-like material. It led up to a floor above that had a stone floor, so Quel couldn't see what waited for him up there, but he could feel two things: the energy signature of his zanpakuto and the raising of his hackles only a powerful opponent can muster.

Trouble lay ahead of him and he knew the only way out of it was to go through it, if he could. Quel took the glass stairs three at a time and arrived in a rush at the room above. It was a courtyard made out of marble brought from the surface at an exorbitant price. Three doors led off of this courtyard and a skylight shone above. An unknown liquid filled the skylight, giving off glimmering watery motes of light along the walls and floor. It was like being in a room with a pool, minus the pool.

Standing in the middle of this room, directly under the skylight, stood the ulitharid who had captured Quel and his companions. It stared at him calmly, unmoving and dispassionate in it's body language. Its eyes shone with enough emotion to make up for its lack of vigor. There was enough glee and greed in its eyes to fill a lake with room to spare for a pond or two. It simply waited for Quel to make his move, its confidence was palpable.

After staring at each other for a few seconds, with nothing happening, Quel took a step forward. The ulitharid still remained unmoving, hardly docile, fully a threat. That was when Quel cast another Kidō spell.  
Quel raised his right hand, a glaring red spark of light appearing on the point of his index finger. He drew an intricate symbols quickly in the air before him, the quickness of his drawing making his mastery of the spell apparent. "_Bakudō #9. Geki."_ He said calmly, breaking up the cloying silence that filled the room. A red glow suffused his body briefly, before it appeared on the ulitharid's body, paralyzing it completely.

Quel breathed a sigh of relief and began to jog towards the door he felt his zanpakuto to be behind. He made it two steps before the ulitharid broke his binding spell. Red light shattering like glass and scattering across the room before dissipating like dust on the wind. It still remained absolutely silent, giving off no expression aside from the glimmer in its eyes. Quel rolled forwards, dodging the larger and undoubtedly more powerful mental cone of energy it finally fired. Using a sonido to get behind his foe Quel aimed a punch at the back of its head.

His fist only hit air as his ulitharid opponent had stepped through a dimensional door made of psionic energy, appearing across the room and firing multiple blasts of mind numbing cones of energy. Quel teleported behind his opponent again, this time before the it could step through another doorway. Instead he found a blisteringly hot wall of flame between him and the ulitharid. Before he knew what to do a hail of glowing balls of flame shot out of the wall and set his clothes on fire. Quel was about to roll around on the ground to douse the fire when he realized it wasn't fireballs that had hit him, but fire spiders. And they were intent on biting and burning him to death.

As he began to bat at the little buggers, he heard the ulitharid casting another spell. His situation was dire and it could all be over within a few brief seconds. Going on instinct, Quel used a sonido to teleport past the wall of flame and appear behind his opponent. This time he found the ulitharid deep into casting another spell. Quel took his time aiming a sokatsui at the back of its head. His spell obliterated much of the room with blue fiery spiritual energy, but failed to damage the three rooms and the floor, taking out only a huge chunk of the ceiling in a giant explosion.

The ulitharid stood unscathed within a barrier as it finished its spell, turning to grin at Quel with its tentacled mouth. It was quite a frightening sight. Quel still had fire spiders clinging to his body and they were causing him great harm. The wall of fire had also been extinguished with Quel's sokatsui, but now three more popped into existence in front and to the sides of Quel, leaving only a blank section of wall in between two of the three rooms not on fire.

Its spell finished, the ulitharid summoned multiple mirrors, having them appear in formation around Quel. Then, quick as lightening the ulitharid fired three cones of mental energy at the mirrors. When they hit the mirrors they multiplied and became six, then twelve, then twenty-four until there were hundreds of them. All speeding at Quel and all of them unavoidable, even by teleporting with a sonido. Quel knew if he got hit by any one of those cones of psionic energy he would be finished in one blow. He had only one shot and little time to do it in. He called to his zanpakuto, reaching towards it through the wall. The ulitharid actually laughed at his pitifulness, until its wall caved in and Quel's zanpakuto flew into his hand. It hadn't expected that.

Quel stood up to his full height as the psionic blasts closed in and locked eyes with the ulitharid as an aura of spiritual energy coalesced around his form, shrouding him in sky blue energy and making his eyes glow with it too.

"_**Soar, Kaze no Koe!"**_ Quel cried out fiercely, running his hand along the blade of his sword and having it glow brilliantly as he did so. In the place of the old and tattered nodachi was now a sword utterly unique and powerful. It had a long and firm hilt that connected to a wide blade that had a complex sigil carved into the blade near the hilt. From there the blade was flat all along the top and exceedingly sharp along the bottom, tapering out into a sharp point five and a half feet long. Quel gripped his sword in two hands and swung it at the ceiling, unleashed a wall of wind that blew through the psionic energy blasts and knocked the ulitharid flying into its own wall of flame.

Quel sent a ball of cutting wind at the ceiling, making a hole that he immediately used a sonido to escape through. The cones of mental energy brushed against him just as he teleported away, numbing his mind ever so slightly. He discovered many illithids were hovering in the air over the tower. They all opened fire on him when they saw him. He quickly dodged back down into the now quiet room and ran through the hole his zanpakuto had created to get to him. He had to widen it with another ball of cutting wind, but he was able to get through it before he heard a terrible shriek/gurgle of anger. Glancing over his shoulder he saw the ulitharid walk out of the diminishing flames, a glow of psionic energy suffusing its body as it raised both of its palms towards Quel.

_Not good!_ Quel sent a ball of cutting wind at it before losing sight of it as he entered its quarters. He saw many trophies and relics, but nothing he could use to escape. He started to panic until Koe manifested next to him, dwarfing everything in the room.

_Be calm Quel, the secret to our escape lies in this room. _Koe looked around the room. _All you need to do to see it is focus._

Quel immediately calmed down. Breathing out a deep sigh, he inhaled and and scanned the room, this time opening up to his senses. He immediately felt a large pressure coming from an old and coral covered vase, or urn. It looked to be overflowing with energy on the invisible, but to all appearances to normal folk was a plain odd vase. Quel kicked it over as he ran past it and threw himself down behind some heavy furniture.

His ulitharid foe walked through a dimensional door into the room right as the vase broke. Out of the vase erupted a giant spectral hydra, which kept growing and growing. The tower shook and trembled from its weight. It broke through the ceiling like it was paper and roared with multiple voices, eight to be exact, breaking the silence that permeated this giant underground chasm for the first time in forever.

Quel knew better than to stick around. His ulitharid foe was too busy to deal with him, so he simply made a hole in the wall with the wind and leaped out onto the air. He pivoted midair and skipped down the side of the tower until he got to a windowsill, which he caught and hung from, catching his breath for a few seconds. He had to haul himself in pretty quickly as the hydra's thrashing was dislodging a lot of stonework and sending pebbles and boulders of debris down into the darkness below. Quel was dead on his feet. He had used so much reiatsu that he felt like he was going to die from it. His body was unused to this much exertion and was rebelling, though it knew better than to give out yet. He knew he was almost out of time. He had to get to Saida and Flau and get them out of here. The hydra should distract the illithid community, but not for long. First he had to make the illithids forget him completely and the only way that would happen was if their beloved elder brain was threatened. With the hydra above it that was working, but he needed to do more if he was to completely succeed. Never do things by half measure was his motto.

Floating in the air beneath the tower Quel could faintly hear the struggles of the hydra from above. He was about a hundred or more stories down from that struggle, so it was faint, but its echoes traveled more loudly in the stillness.

He called on his zanpakuto and fired a huge Kazekiba Henka no Ginga to cut the support beams off below the tower. He didn't want to destroy them all at once, just halfway so he had time to get inside before the tower plummeted to its doom, the elder brain along for the ride. Quel nearly fainted right there in midair as his attack worked and half of the support pillars were cut clean in half. Fighting his own body to force it to work Quel slowly made his way up to one of the lower tower windows and hauled himself through it. He briefly wondered why they bothered with windows before he encountered trouble and the answer to his question.

Multiple floating eyeballs with one small tail, or eyestalk, swarmed him as he touched down inside the tower. They were a type of magical creation illithids used as scouts and sentries. Gross and efficient. Quel blasted them off his body with a gust of wind and ran on, cutting them down with every blow, trying to stop them from swarming him and killing him right there in the hallway. It was slow, fast and dangerous work. Slow because of his impeded progress; fast because if he misaimed one blow he would most likely be overwhelmed; and dangerous for obvious reasons.

Though they had no mouths to bite him they had an aura of harm that acted like a magical electric net, invisible to the eye but no less painful. Just think of small, fast flying electric eels and you see his problem. He cut down many of them quickly, but had to resort to an aura of cutting wind like a cloak after he received multiple stings to his arms and legs, slowing him even further. His aura of wind cut the flying eyeballs to ribbons, spraying their remains across the hallway.

He was breathing an inward sigh of relief when he rushed out into a fork in the hallway and was faced with two paths to choose from. To his right lay an empty hallway that went up out of sight and to his left there was a hallway that stretched out towards the center of the tower. Down that hallway Quel saw two beholders, terrible creatures that looked like floating scaly heads of cyclops with floating tentacles with eyes on the end. Unfortunately for Quel it wasn't two beholders, but two mindwitnesses. They turned and saw Quel, immediately unleashing their eye beam attacks that beholders are so well known for along with psionic cones of energy. Groaning in annoyance and exhaustion, Quel turned down the right hand passage and ran as fast as he could. He wished he had paid better attention in the Academy to learn barrier Kidō but he barely knew any strong enough for his current predicament. And so another chase began. Quel ran on and on and managed to get out of the tower and into the underground network of halls and caverns that made up the main community of illithids, but he had to dodge to the side and weave through a hail of beam attacks and more psionic blasts. After doing this for almost five minutes, Quel had had enough and was willing to be overly bold and face the two mindwitnesses. He skidded to a halt and swung his sword behind him as he turned, firing a crescent Kazekiba Henka no Ginga that cut the sides of the hallway cleanly as it sped toward the two mindwitnesses.

It cut the first one clean in half, but gave the one behind enough time to duck underneath it. Quel was prepared for this and as the mindwitness looked up at Quel after dodging his attack it received an eyeful of a small Shakkahō spell, blinding its main eye and making it scream in pain and anger. Safe for the moment, Quel ran on until he found an empty hall to lean on his knees and gasp in. Every breath was torture, his lungs on fire and his limbs spasming with every passing second. With a grim determination, he knew he would continue until his last breath.

He had to find Saida and Flau. He knew he had to use his nose if he was to find them in time. So stuffing his propriety in a back pocket he got down on all fours and sniffed the ground like a dog. He did this for quite some time, until he picked up on a faint trace of Saida's scent and followed it. It was only a matter of time until he found her and Flau, but time was never kind to Quel when he needed it to be.


	14. 13 Beautiful Beast

_**Chapter Thirteen: Beautiful Beast**_

**Toril, Vi'schruk, November 25th, 1391 a.c.**

Z'Thurun floated above the ruin of what remained of his chambers. The elder brain was safe for now. The community had managed to stop the spectral hydra from growing any larger and had inserted it back into another urn. The man who had done all of this was missing, though two mindwitnesses had just been killed, their deaths felt like a ripple across the community. No doubt it was his handiwork. Z'Thurun had gathered together a task force dedicated to hunting down this dangerous human, who was not normal for his kind, and killing him. It was unheard of for a human to have this kind of power. The ulitharid floated down to the settling rubble that was all that remained of his home. His two cohorts, B'ixre and Li'renga, the other two Archons, were absent. They were traveling elsewhere and would likely be outraged when they learned what had become of their homes.

Shifting around his destroyed chambers Z'Thurun found a small pair of wands and a crystal orb. He would need these three items to win in what he knew would be a fierce upcoming fight. He would make that insignificant human pay for his transgressions against the superior beings that illithids were.

Running through the many twisting corridors and passages of the subterranean city of mind flayers Quel's every breath was a gasp in pain and exhaustion's unyielding hands were dragging him to the pits of despair with every passing moment. He had encountered no mind flayers, or their minions, since his brief encounter with the two mindwitnesses. He had dispatched them quickly enough and had expected constant pursuit after that. Instead he found his progress towards the slave market district of the city all too easy.

He knew a trap was forthcoming, but he could no more avoid it than he could choose to not to save his friends. Saida and Flau lay somewhere in front of him. All he had to do was follow their ever stronger scents to find them. Hopefully the elder brain's tower would fall apart before he was ambushed, but he suspected he just wasn't going to be that lucky. The rooms and halls he passed through looked much the same: drab grey stone decorated with few tapestries robbed from other cultures. Other minor trophies decorated the city at odd intervals. Mind flayers were not known for their artistry, unless you counted torture as an art.

Quel finally arrived at a point where Saida and Flau's scents were strong enough for him to know beyond a doubt that they were very close. Kicking open a thick wooden door, he barged into a room that was empty save for numerous female slaves in alluring and skimpy clothing. They all stared blankly in front of themselves, seeing and taking in nothing of their surroundings. Quel stepped into the room and paused as the slaves parted like the Red Sea. Standing beyond them was an unpleasant sight: the ulitharid from before had beaten Quel to this place and he had brought with him reinforcements. At least twenty illithids, two of whom looked like sorcerers holding crystal wands, four uchuulons, which were crab-like monsters known as chuul that had mind flayer tadpoles inserted into them, transforming them into powerful cogs in the evil mind flayer machine. What looked like ten neothelids, which were mind flayer tadpoles that survive, but fails to undergo ceremorphis, making them resemble giant purple snakes with sharp flowers for heads and long slobbery tongues, were also there along the outside of the formation arrayed against little ol' Quelly.

But what caught Quel's eye was something else. Standing behind these forces there was a giant figure that had scared man since the beginning of time: a dragon. Not just any kind of dragon either, it was a special evil variety known as a brainstealer dragon. It was a deep purple and red with the body of a dragon, albeit slimmer; its head was smooth, unadorned by horns that most dragons usually had; its eyes were empty of any iris, making them a milky yellow, like two full moons; and its mouth ended in not a snout, but a long writhing mass of tentacles longer than its head and serpentine neck combined. And surrounding all of them was a large mob of illithidae, the wild animals of mind flayer kind. Only these wild animals have feeding tentacles and are ugly as sin. Unable to draw forth a brain with their feeding tentacles like mind flayers can they resort to animal brutality instead. Illithidae also have a slimy coating like mind flayers to prevent adhesion and to serve as another line of defense.

All in all Quel faced about sixty angry psionists and their ugly brood. He was all by himself. Worst of all, Saida stood like a statue right next to the ulitharid, Flau a duplicate, paler statue next to her. The ulitharid had one hand on each of their shoulders, left on Saida, right on Flau and its two long tentacles that also denoted it as an ulitharid caressed Flau and Saida's heads. It was giving Quel a smug look as it laid its filthy, slime covered hands on his friends. The brainstealer dragon, its tentacles too long for comfort, were also caressing the two girls. A plainer taunt was never made my dear readers.

Something in Quel snapped. After all he had done to get here only to have the two people he wanted to save flaunted in front of him like pieces of meat...he exploded in rage, heedless of his injuries and what would happen. All he cared for was saving them. A small part of Quel's spirit revelled in this moment as he did what he loved to do: fight. The rest cared only for Saida and Flau.

Screaming his rage, Quel raised his zanpakuto over his head. "Kazenokami no hōkō !" he cried, pointing his blade at the gathered horde of illithids and illithid-kin. They all tried to rush him, but a low roar quickly built up into a typhoon that swept them all off their feet and pushed them back against the rear wall. This strong wind did not let up and slaves and slavers alike were flattened against the ground. Quel walked through the wind, a part of it and unopposed by its ferocity. He grabbed Saida and Flau by their wrists and hauled them to their feet. Once he touched them he bestowed his affinity to the wind upon them, so that they could stand at his side with backs straight as everyone else struggled to stay rooted to the ground. The weaker illithids and illithidae were one by one being swept out of the room, down the adjoining passages. Somehow the slaves were being held where they were, unharmed but restrained.

It was so loud that yelling at the full capacity of one's lungs would have produced no noticeable noise. Deafening only began to describe the sheer power and force of this summoned wind. It brought wind where no wind had ever blown before, cleaning the foul air in a mighty and over the top fashion. Quel dragged Saida and Flau away from their former captors and shoved them in front of him. Typhoon still in full force, Quel herded Saida and Flau back the way he had come. He was too focused on them to see the attack coming, but when he did it was too late to stop it. The wind suddenly shifted, twisting out of Quel's control and coming from his back. He turned to see the ulitharid standing, its kin were just then regaining their feet. It had somehow wrested control of the wind away from him, but that wasn't the worst of it. It had teleported four illithidae right behind him so that he got tackled before he knew they were there.

Escape was no longer an option. The ulitharid fired a cone of energy at Saida as Quel was falling, and noticing the difference of this cone of energy, he kicked Saida off her feet, so that she landed next to him and the beam passed over her head to hit the wall farther back up the passage where the passage forked. Glancing up as he wrestled with a tentacled horror Quel saw a large portion of the wall where the energy beam had hit simply turn into dust and dissipate in the air.

The illithidae on Quel was like a combination between a bear, pig and a hyena and it was completely black with red eyes. It had four tentacles around a beak like mouth that snapped and could plough into the stone floor like it was only hardened dirt. Quel wriggled and wrestled with it until he got his zanpakuto under it and stabbed up, making it scream in pain as it died. The other three illithidae had taken Flau and Saida back towards the ulitharid and its minions. Quel wouldn't stand for that.

Shoving the dead carcass of the illithidae off of him and getting momentarily grossed out over its odd blood covering his torso, Quel got back to his feet in a single leap. His previous typhoon was dissipating, but he simply waved his zanpakuto and summoned another even stronger one that knocked everyone but him and the ulitharid off their feet. It stood rooted to the floor, unable to move but unperturbed by the wind as well. Saida and Flau skidded along the floor towards the mind flayers until Quel beckoned with his blade a few more times, summoning gusts of strong cutting wind to kill the three illithidae and carry Saida and Flau back to his side. They were halfway back when they vanished, only to reappear by the ulitharid's side.

Then, before Quel could do anything the ulitharid grabbed Saida and Flau and all three of them vanished. It was then Quel realized that he had been ignoring the brainstealer dragon all this time. It wrested control of the wind from him again and, making him realize it had been the one to take control of the wind the first time. The wind echoed its previous action and did an about face, allowing the illithids and illithidae to regain their feet. A hail of mental cones of mind numbing energy soon came at Quel, like a wall of arrows.

Before he could respond to this a giant crystal suddenly exploded near him, appearing out of nowhere, its many shards cutting him fiercely across the front of his body. He did manage to shield his face and neck though. Trying to remain calm, he dodged the cones of mental energy by using a sonido to appear behind them. He fired a point blank sokatsui at his aggressors without an incantation, making it weaker but faster than his usual one. It exploded in a hail of blue spiritual energy, making him lose sight of the illithids, illithidae and the brainstealer dragon. This was short lived.

An astral projection of the brainstealer dragon charged out of the cloud of dust the sokatsui had created, leaping at Quel. He rolled to the side, dodging its wild leap, but as it landed it swiped at him with its tail before pivoting around to face him. Quel leaped over the tail swipe and used a sonido to appear behind it, where he summoned another typhoon of wind, which of course had no effect on the astral projection. It was then he noticed another hail of psionic cones of energy heading his way. The astral dragon swiped its tail at him again, knocking him flying backwards several yards and cracking at least one rib.

Saida and Flau were gone, but Quel refused to give up. Coughing up blood, he felt a pain that was far more deadly than any physical pain: his stomach cramped and burned, incapacitating him. This was a wound unlike any other he had suffered, it was the seal on his stomach activating, hindering and sucking away his reiatsu. His very life force was being syphoned away. Death was a real possibility, a certain possibility, if he didn't end this fight soon.

Then he felt tendrils of goo snap onto his body and begin to wrap him from head to foot. Fearing some giant spider was cocooning him, Quel was even more dismayed to discover it was ectoplasm appearing out of thin air (another dimension actually) that was disabling him. All too soon he was completely encased in this ectoplasmic cocoon. Panicking he had to calm himself before he realized a quick solution to escape. A quick shock wave of cutting wind outward from his body later and he had reduced the ectoplasm to ribbons. The astral dragon loomed right in front of him having charged while he was in the cocoon, so he cast another quick geki spell, freezing the astral dragon in place. Quel was relieved his gambit had worked: Kidō affected the astral projection. Another barrage of psionic cones of energy arrived, this time passing around Quel. The frozen dragon made a good shield.

The astral dragon vanished and the real brainstealer dragon teleported to appear in front of him, smashing its forelegs down to shatter the ground. He leaped back as it landed, avoiding the brunt of the blow, but suffering some cuts and abrasions from flying stone. He slashed the air in front of him as he landed, creating a crescent shaped gust of wind that cut through the air like a sickle. The brainstealer dragon couldn't avoid the gust and it was hit full force, absorbing the wind completely. It had used a fundamental psionic ability to absorb the damage and power of his attack. It then slammed its forelegs down again, using the energy from Quel's attack to shatter the ground in an even larger ripple of cracks and rifts. Quel leaped back again. His warrior instincts then screamed and he used a sonido to land on the brainstealer dragon's back, turning to see many illithids appearing right behind where he had just been standing. His stomach was on fire, the cramps and burning slowly spreading up and down his body, like his blood was painfully full of a fiery toxin.

Quel gasped for air with every breath and was drenched in his own sweat. His battle was equally with himself as it was with the evil brain fiends.

The brainstealer dragon snapped its head around and tried to grab Quel in its tentacled maw. He didn't run or dodge to the side. Quel slashed and hacked, cutting its giant tentacles off as it pressured him against the side wall of the passage. It thrashed and screamed in anger at his attacks, finally teleporting away, leaving him and its tentacles to fall to the stone floor. Yet another hail of mental cones of energy were flying at Quel, only this time they were coming from both sides. He grew a bit worried over this until he solved his problem with a single brilliant insight.

He used another sonido to teleport behind one of the illithids in front of him, knowing that they had shells of psionic energy covering themselves to protect from their own mind blasts. Then, as soon as the cones of mental energy hit this wall of mind flayers, he began lopping off heads, limbs and tentacles. His sword strikes bounced off of course. The mind flayers had shells of psionic energy protecting them from physical blows. They panicked even if his blows did them no harm, stumbling away from him and firing mind blasts at him point blank, but he just used repeated sonido jumps to appear right where they least expected and continued to hit them, until he saw another barrage incoming from the other firing squad of mind flayers farther down the passage. Things were becoming too multidimensional and too hectic for his liking, so he simply used another sonido to teleport far down the passage back the way he had come, right at the turn in the passage where the ulitharid had turned the section of wall into dust.

Running back the way he came Quel felt grim. Saida and Flau were gone from him again and this time he had no way of finding them by their scent. What was more his burning pain that his seal conveyed as a warning for him to stop using his power was spreading from his stomach and had gone as far as the tops of his knees and the top of his six-pack. Time was short and Quel had not even dented his opponents numbers enough to have a fighting chance.

Bi'xre stood in mid air looking upon the near calamity an intruder had done to the foundation pillars of the elder brain's tower. Half of them had been cut clean in half, like some giant blade had simply severed them. As he floated there in consternation, his fellow Archon, Z'Thurun appeared next to him all of a sudden, two females in tow. Z'Thurun had them floating limply in suspended animation.

_What has transpired in my absence?_ Bi'xre communicated telepathically, a deadly coldness in his mental tone.

_Nothing so serious as to require your attention,_ Z'Thurun lied pathetically. _It is just an escaped slave soon to be recaptured._

Bi'xre gave Z'Thurun a measuring glare. _This_-he gestured at the severed support pillars-_is not nothing. Enough of your games Z'Thurun, I will have my answers and I will have the cortex of my elder brain's enemy in my stomach. Speak wisely._

Z'Thurun stared back at Bi'xre in petulant anger for all of two seconds before looking away in defeat, his face tentacles wriggling in a nervous tic he had. Z'Thurun may have had tremendous talent for even an ulitharid, but Bi'xre's psionic mastery made even a prodigy like Z'Thurun back down from a fight. For now at least. Everyone grew old eventually and Bi'xre was no different. Z'Thurun comforted himself with this idea and formulated a reply he thought Bi'xre would want to hear. _He is a young adult male human near death with a blade that gives off an unknown energy source._

Bi'xre fixed another glare on Z'Thurun. _Unknown? What do you mean unknown?_

_We were unable to match its energy source to any in our city's library._ Z'Thurun retorted. _It's unlike any weapon, magical or otherwise, we've encountered before._

Bi'xre was intrigued, but he didn't let this show. _Where is this slave now? _he asked.

_Heading this way, half dead from fatigue. _Replied Z'Thurun. _He is my meal._

_He is what I choose for him to be._ Bi'xre said in such a cold telepathic voice that Z'Thurun involuntarily flinched.

Mind flayers were known for their arrogance, but Bi'xre added an extra flair of cold blooded fury that even his fellow mind flayers could not match. Those who interacted with him quickly learned to stay off his radar if he went into one of his "moods." Like the one he was in now, so Z'Thurun reigned in his own prerogatives and ambition to fight another day. Live and fight another day. Bi'xre wasn't in his right mind when he got like this.

Bi'xre opened a dimensional door and stepped through it, vanishing from sight. Z'Thurun was left off balance. His tentacles wriggled in agitation as he floated down and followed Bi'xre through the door.

Quel arrived back at the hall he had come through earlier where the illithids had ambushed him with an invisibility spell. This time four people stood in the middle of the hall waiting for him. They didn't bother to hide. Saida and Flau stood mindless next to the two ulitharids, utterly controlled. Before he could do anything but gasp hoarsely the taller and darker skinned ulitharid spoke.

"You have come far human, but your defeat is certain. These two females are important to you. Surrender now and I will not torture them in front of you before your death."

"Give them both to me and return their minds to them and I will not kill you both and your elder brain." Quel retorted with equal menace in his voice, the fact that he was gasping out every word ruining his bravado.

Both ulitharids laughed their alien gurgling laughs. "You are dead on your feet boy. I offered you this one chance only to save myself some time. Your death is assured," the dark purple one gloated. As simple as that the battle was on.

Quel didn't wait for them to strike. He teleported behind them, aiming a quick stab at the dark purple ulitharid. His sword blow slammed against the back of the ulitharid's neck and made it stumble forwards. The other brain fiend that still held Saida and Flau aimed a psionic cone at Quel's head. He used a mini sonido to teleport a step to the side, dodging the blast. Switching tactics, he let go of his zanpakuto with one hand and fired a sokatsui without the incantation at the dark purple ulitharid. The resulting explosion of blue energy made Quel lose sight of both of his enemies. Teleporting away from where he was, Quel found himself standing in midair over a bottomless abyss. He had blasted off one entire wall and half of the floor with his sokatsui spell. The cloud of dust dissipated to reveal the two mind flayers floating in mid air with Saida and Flau also floating behind them.

The dark purple ulitharid inhaled and exhaled a giant stream of acid breath. Quel used another sonido to get out of reach of the acid and watched as it landed on the remaining piece of floor, reducing it to ruin. Quel waved his sword and unleashed a storm of wind scythes that spun end over end until they crashed against the walls, cutting large furrows into the stone and shooting clouds of dust and debris into the air. Every one that hit the ulitharids was absorbed, not even scratching them. His lower torso flared up in pain at that moment, making him clutch his stomach and fall down a few feet in mid air before he caught the air again. The ulitharids' eyes glinted as they looked on his weakened state. Despair choked him from the inside, making him feel a coldness deep down inside.

"You're almost at your limit," the dark purple ulitharid remarked casually, hunger in its eyes and tone.

"Soon you will beg us to kill you," said the one holding Saida and Flau, glee contorting its ugly face.

Quel smiled a smile as cold as the void of space, his eyes looking beyond the room and its occupants, those he sought to kill and those he desperately desired to save, to a time long gone, a world long since lost.

The smell of moon flowers was easy for him to recall, as well as the songs sung around a campfire on moonless nights. Cerulean skies and emerald hills, the afterglow of the sunset and the rise of three moons. Those were the days when life was fresh and young and he had no understanding of the concept of sorrow, or the memories of calamity.

Snapping back to focus on the here and now, he breathed a deep sigh, letting go of everything tying him down. His loved ones, his sorrow, his oath, his regrets and his wishes. The ulitharids had been watching Quel collect himself with amusement, the dark purple one smiling and the one holding Flau and Saida began muttering a spell. They were secure in the knowledge of their own might, but always cautious.

_I doubt I'll be able to touch them with their psionic shields covering them. If I can't take them out, I'll settle for second best. I leave the rest to you Saida, take care of yourself. Flau I'm sorry I couldn't find your parents with you, never give up the search._ He began to recite a very powerful Kidō spell, noticing that the ulitharid had come to the end of its spell. The wall of the hall next to Quel formed a giant mouth as big as a dragon's and then tried to bite him. Quel teleported again, this time far outside the tower. He dashed out into the abyss, his feet skating on the sky, with nothing but darkness before him and the light from the mind flayer's tower behind him. Stopping when he got far enough out to see the whole tower, Quel aimed carefully at where he had last seen the elder brain and began again his incantation:

"_Limit of the thousand hands, respectful hands, unable to touch the darkness. Shooting hands unable to reflect the blue sky,_

Glowing pink spears of energy, eight in all, began to form around Quel_. _They shone with a fierce energy that was blinding to the naked eye.

"_The road that basks in light, the wind that ignited the embers, time that gathers when both are together, there is no need to be hesitant, obey my orders. Light bullets, eight bodies, nine items, book of heaven, diseased treasure, great wheel, grey fortress tower. Aim far away, scatter brightly and cleanly when fired. __**Hadō #91. Senjū Kōten Taihō!**_"

And then, incantation complete, all eight energy spears shot away quicker than the eye could track. A millisecond later they detonated in the elder brain's chamber, incinerating it and blowing up the tower's upper twenty plus floors. All eight spears had joined up to form at the focal point of his target, taking the shape of a giant north star, sakura pink in coloration and molten in its intensity. The entire structure of the tower shook and swayed from the explosion. Quel looked upon the ruined bastion of evil as it slowly began to deteriorate. His vision began to darken and he knew it was only a matter of seconds until he would fall unconscious and plummet to his death. He had used up all of his reiatsu, the seal on his stomach was now eating away at his life force and soon it would force him unconscious. If he had been on the ground he would have survived, but because there was nothing underneath him but the cold dark depths of the abyss he would surely die. He was too tired to feel very much dismay.

Saida awoke to the feeling of a cold breeze caressing her bare skin. The next sensation she felt was hearing an unusual noise, like that of a wailing fish. The ground shook, jolting her fully awake. Standing in front of her were two ugly as hell humanoids that were covered in slime with the lower halves of their heads covered in tentacles. Flau was shaking herself awake next to Saida. Saida knew the danger they were in, for the Ctarl Ctarl Empire made a concerted effort to know about anything that could present a threat to them and mind flayers were counted high on that list.

Leaping up into the air, Saida snapped off two rapid kicks to the sides of each mind flayer's head before landing in a crouch and sending a combined large shock waves from her joined fists to send the mind flayers flying. Their heads didn't absorb the kicks well, psionic shields in disarray for some reason and the shock waves knocked them flying far across the room. Saida didn't give them a chance to breath. She called on her ancestral blood trait and transformed into a giant sleek cat-like beast. She looked like a cross between a caracal and an ocelot (If you have any idea what those two breeds of felidae look like, then rock on! Google 'em my dear readers.), with the long tufted ears similar to caracals, the myriad coat of stripes similar to ocelots, and the thin sleek frame of both, with the long slim tail of an ocelot. Her mouth was filled with clean white razor sharp fangs that glistened with saliva in the dim light of the cavernous hall. A low rumble escaped from her chest and came barreling out of her throat like waves breaking against an oceanside cliff.

She leaped across the entire length of the room in one four legged bound, landing on the dark purple ulitharid and clamping down with her strong jaws on its throat. She thrashed her head back and forth until she broke its neck. She dropped it without a second glance and pounced on the second ulitharid just as it was regaining its feet, killing it with equal ferocity.

By now Flau had regained her senses, her lack of experience and training slowing her recovery rate from her deep hypnosis. She looked up at Saida in beast form, mouth dripping dark red blood and pale bits of mind flayer flesh and her eyes grew very wide. Before she could scream the giant beast leaped away through the remaining doorway and vanished. Flau breathed a sigh of relief before she even realized it. She was suddenly all alone with two mind flayer corpses. Pieces of the ceiling began to fall with every renewed shake of the room. Everything was falling apart around her: it was a surreal moment to awaken to.

Flau, with little choice in the matter, ran after the wild beast. She never noticed the torn bits of clothing that were similar to the ones she wore lying on the ground next to her. The clothes Saida had torn to pieces when she had transformed into the beast.

Quel felt something lick his face. He grumbled in his sleep, not really knowing where he was. He felt his face get licked again and tried to swipe at the offending face licker. His arm muscles ached from overexertion as he began to move, making him snap fully awake. As he opened his eyes he remembered that he had been falling into the abyss outside of the mind flayer city before he had lost consciousness. He opened his eyes to see a giant cat visage in his face, mouth covered in blood and tiny chunks of what must be mind flayer flesh.

He was too overwhelmed to do anything for a second, with the giant cat sitting over him, purring and licking his face, its mouth coated in things best left undisclosed.

"Ewwww," he finally managed to say, the giant cat finally stopped licking him and he got a good look at it. A complex pattern of stripes criss crossed its frame and it had long ears with big tufts of fur on the ends that made its ears look like horns in the right light.

Even as Quel regarded it it began to transform before his eyes. It shrank and condensed, becoming even smaller until it solidified in the form of a young naked woman, one that was very familiar to him.

"_SAIDA?!"_ he said dumbfounded.

Dreamily she looked up at him. "Hi Quel," she said sleepily. "I was so worried you'd be dead. I'm glad you're alive."

She collapsed into his arms. He held her there for a few seconds, unsure as to what was proper protocol when holding a naked unconscious woman. The ground shaking violently underneath him solved his dilemma. Quel carried Saida in his arms, supporting her under her shoulders and under her legs where her thighs met her knees. He ran with her through the empty corridors and rooms of the tower, not sure how he had gotten there when he had remembered falling outside of this tower the last time he had been conscious. He resolutely ignored her nakedness (most of the time) as he carried her wearily through the collapsing community of evil doers. He had no time to be distracted, so he put his doubts to the side and focused on the here and now. He arrived at an intersection of three passages and found his first mind flayers. He tensed when he saw them, but almost immediately relaxed. They were panicked, some clutching their heads and some trying to break open a door with their bare hands, clearly desperate. Quel pretended he didn't see any of that and continued down another passage.

He ran on and on, up stairs and down hallways, through collapsing rooms and beyond the tower's last moments. He encountered hordes of freed slaves that were both terrified and exhilarated at their newfound and sudden freedom. They were rioting, some killing their former masters, others fleeing for their lives. Those that got caught by their former masters quickly had their brains devoured while they were still alive, it was a horrible sight to see. The whole mind flayer community was in chaos, the former slaves seeming to have an edge as everyone killed each other. The slaves were banding together, goblins, ogres, orcs, elves, humans, halflings, and many other races from across Toril. They all stood and fought together. Racism went out the window in that moment. It was revolution, pandemonium and war all rolled into one brilliant explosion that was no place anyone sane wanted to be. Quel ran through it all, close calls nearly ending his life and Saida's more times than he cared to think about.

Finally he knew he had escaped from the city's doom and could pause to collect himself when he was in caves not echoing with the sounds of anarchy. The few mind flayers he had seen recently had been in disarray, barely cognizant. Today would be a day of catastrophe for them all. Mind flayers would not soon forget this day of reckoning.

Quel was stopping to catch his breath when he saw Flau run by farther up where another intersection was. They were on the outskirts of the city. It was deserted and quiet like a tomb.

"Hey!" he yelled.

A moment later Flau's head peeked back around the corner. "There you are!" she said.

He ran up to her and they both continued down the passage she had been headed down.

"What's on her face?" Flau asked, pointing to Saida's blood covered mouth and cheeks.

"She killed people with her mouth obviously," Quel explained.

Flau just looked at him.

"Where were you?" he asked, changing the subject. "The last time I checked you and Saida were together. How'd you get separated?"

"I don't know," Flau replied slowly, shaking her head. "When I woke up a giant cat was killing two of these ugly things that captured us."

"They're called mind flayers," he said. "They're some of the worst bastards to run into."

"And you knew they were down here?!" she said angrily.

"Yeah, but I didn't plan on us getting captured!" Quel retorted. "They're rare to encounter!"

"That's no excuse!"

"You can't avoid danger Flau!" he looked Flau in the eye. "Dangers like mind flayers are just something you're going to have to get used to if you plan on going out into the universe!"

"We all nearly suffered fates worse than death!" she said angrily, gesturing at her absurd clothes, or lack thereof, as proof. She did look rather odd in a slave girl's skimpy uniform.

"But we didn't and we won't!" he argued. "I don't have a strong point to make, but I want you to know we'll find your parents and survive together!"

Flau got slightly teary eyed, pent up emotions leaking forth. "Fine Quel. I'll hold you to that," she said, knowing arguing at a time like this was a waste of time.

"I know," he replied softly.

Back behind them they heard a loud series of resounding cracks that echoed thunderously. Quel had a strong guess as to what they were. But when he heard the unforgettable and unmistakable sound of a collapsing building echoing down the passage behind them, like an avalanche, he knew the tower was crashing down into the depths of the Underdark, forever to be lost.

"What's that noise?" Flau asked worried.

Quel, smiling, told her what it was in detail.

"You did all that?" she asked, shocked and impressed.

"Yes," he said. "And now I need to sleep."

He collapsed, making sure to fall on his back with Saida splayed across him. Quel was out before he hit the ground. Saida lay spread eagled across Quel, snoring contentedly. Her nakedness was most unladylike, more so than her gargantuan gorilla snores. Flau looked at both of them and sighed disgustedly before chuckling. Without complaint she dragged them both into a side room that was basically an empty storage closet. There Flau laid them side by side and went scavenging for clothing back in the mind flayer community. She knew if she was spotted she would be done for, so she stayed at the periphery of the city, always on high alert for any signs of mind flayers.

After searching for an hour or so she stumbled upon a room filled with random goods, some clothes, some foodstuffs and many more oddities. Flau picked clothing that looked good and carried it out for Saida and she also filled a satchel with some of the food she found elsewhere in her search. Most of it looked spoiled and it was all slightly moldy, but all that mattered was that she had food and clothes. She ran back to the cave and plopped everything down next to Quel and Saida, both still fast asleep. She closed and barred the room's door and sat down to rest. When Quel and Saida both woke up it would be time to leave, until then Flau planned on getting a few winks. They all deserved a good long rest after their ordeal.


	15. 14 Demon Hunter

_**Chapter Fourteen: Demon Hunter**_

**Toril, Somewhere Under the Great Sea, November 28th, 1391 a.c.**

Morning came to the lightless cavern the three weary travelers rested in. Though no light from the sun shone in the deep regions of the earth where they slept they nonetheless knew it was morning: their bodies told them so. Quel groaned as he stretched on his back, feeling his inner injuries beginning to heal. Flau sat up and blearily rubbed her eyes, while Saida returned from her lookout position. It had been three long days since their escape from the mind flayer community and every day felt like a new decade to them. They had no memory of their time while imprisoned, but they still felt freedom beyond comparison regardless. Quel reached into his backpack and rationed out their meager breakfast. It consisted of dried meat of a better left unknown variety and stale pieces of bread.

Quel wore the remnants of his gladiatorial garb, which was little better than a stylish outfit of rags and leather vambraces. Flau still wore her slave girl clothes, though she had found a nice cloak to put over the top of it. Saida, thankfully, was no longer naked. Flau had found her a nice outfit when she had gotten herself the cloak. Saida wore a shirt and shorts, nothing else would fit. So there they were, the half starved, semi-naked band of escaped slaves from a mind flayer city. Flau and Saida were taking out their frustrations on Quel, blaming him for the whole thing. He should have known better than to lead them into an ambush by brain fiends. He debated whether to argue he had been the one to save them all, but figured that wouldn't do his case much good. It was a moot point to them, he knew.

Without the map they would have been utterly lost, but Quel had risked life and brain by going back into the middle of the vile city to find the valuable thing. It was by the most divine luck that he remembered it had a unique ink dyed into it that gave it a very peculiar pickle like smell. Using that as his guidepost he soon found it after spending only five or so hours aimlessly wandering the chaotic city in the last throes of a revolution by its freed slaves. Most of the mind flayers had been violently killed or executed, but some had managed to shore up certain key places in the city and were holding out against the assaults by their slaves turned improv army.

Our group had traveled through a unique subterranean world on their journey away from Vi'schruk. Giant fissures and chasms dotted the Underdark here, small barriers with labyrinths of twisting passages separating them. In each chasm and fissure land bridges had been constructed. They looked ancient and definitely constructed, not formed. They were the remnants of some long lost civilization, but one so foregone that only the bridges remained to remind those who knew what they were, not that anyone knew. These bridges were giant, crossing miles of vast emptiness in some chambers and never twisting, always going straight, through what seemed impassable terrain. They bored through solid rock and arced over endless abysses. Amazingly they were also lit by small patches of bioluminescent fungi along their sides, like natural torches in sconces.

Another unique trait of this zone of the Underdark was the multitude of giant waterfalls that seemed to come out of the unknown sky and fall into the pitch black depths below. Some of these waterfalls were miles long and wide, but others were no better than trickles, barely visible. The smell of salt was in the air, so it was a safe bet to assume this was seawater from the Great Sea miles and miles above. How it dribbled down into the depths like this without the entire area being submerged was a mind boggling thing to wrap one's brain around. Something must be behind this phenomenon, but they didn't have time to figure it out. So they passed through the dark depths, along a lighted path of wavering wisps of fungi, with a pervasive salty mist clinging to them. The giant waterfalls echoed eternally in these caves, making them never silent and always filled with a low vibration, the song of water flowing.

They had encountered no living things since their escape and this disturbing lack of life was what they expected to find near such a large mind flayer community. Traveling in the blackness had become routine. They carried one torch each and plenty of fuel. Quel led the way this day, with Saida guarding the rear. They traveled for miles without speaking or stopping once. Finally they tarried in a small alcove set within one of the barrier walls of this region. They ate lunch and rested for a brief span of time. As they were completely falling into their relaxation a glimmer of light appeared in the waterfall and shot out to float amid them. Before panic could completely develop within them the light resolved itself into a little winged man floating slightly above them.

He was beautiful, with gray moth like wings, silvery skin and large black eyes that lacked an iris and seemed too big for his face. He wore unremarkable clothing, enchanting in its simpleness. The contrast between the creature's beauty and its unadorned clothing felt right. He carried a harp that seemed formed out of stone. He trilled a few notes on it as he gazed at all three of them in turn, pausing last on Quel for a long time.

"I came to see you off Farlanders," he said. "You did a great service to all who live in this area by destroying the mind flayer city."

"You're welcome, though it was more for our survival than anything else," Quel replied.

Flau and Saida glanced at each other.

The little winged man smiled. "My kind do not usually interact with anyone besides ourselves."

"You don't look like a typical Underdark race," Quel said in agreement.

"We are Gloura," said the little man. "We only help those in desperate need of us. This is why I helped when you fell unconscious outside of the mind flayer citadel."

"So you're the one who saved me," Quel said. "Thanks. If not for you I wouldn't be here."

"It is my way, therefore I value it as nothing beyond normal."

"Uh, well thanks anyway."

"I come now to offer you one piece of advice. Do not stay long in the Sandy Depths, for bad things happen to those who tarry long 'er they move on."

The little man bobbed his head once and winked out of existence.

"Wow," Saida said. "Was he odd, or was it me?."

"Totally," Flau concurred.

Saida regarded Flau suspiciously for a moment, then turned and grinned at Quel. "You know how to entertain a girl all right."

Not knowing exactly how to respond to a comment like that he chose to shrug.

Days turned into weeks. The solitude soon became a cramping thing, allowing an insubstantial itch to creep into their minds. Not a maddening itch, but as all itches are inherently annoying it wasn't comfortable either. The scenery changed as they walked, becoming more claustrophobic. The giant chasms and fissures became winding passages of stone and piles of sand. These passages were much narrower and the walls were more jagged from almost no erosion of the stone from water to smooth them out. Piles of sand soon became common, with the piles often being muddy in the beginning and varied states of dryness marking their progression away from the watery realm of the Underdark. The waterfalls vanished, with an occasional dripping from the ceiling the lackluster replacement to the mighty flood. When the piles were too large to simply walk around they would spend hours digging with their hands to find a way through, or be forced to double back to find another way around. This happened constantly as time went by.

Danger was a constant in this realm, with death being a close companion all along the journey. They now encountered giant skeletons, often with only a few bones remaining, in scattered places along their path. Strange new plants that were of a decidedly non fungi genus greeted their eyes in the darkness. These plants resembled cacti, only they were dark greys, purples and blues in the torchlight, with a sickly yellow, pink and orange coloring to the stamen. What was more the one time they decided to touch these odd new plants they shrank back violently, like some exotic underwater life form. After that they decided to not touch the plants, if they could help it, again. The good news was that the land sloped up as they traveled. With every mile they went up a few feet, narrowing the amount of land above their heads by small degrees.

The sand soon became more prevalent than the rock, if that was possible. It flowed down the walls like water in some places, pooling in the middle of the floors and creating whirlpools of sand before vanishing into the earth. It was a very magical place. Quel, Saida and Flau avoided getting anywhere near such places as death was a promise if you happened to fall into one. Soon the walls and ceiling widened out, creating many vast caverns and chambers under the ground. They were connected to each other like pieces in a puzzle forever separated, but still so close to one another they could almost be kissing. In these chambers and rooms the sand was everywhere. It covered the floors in most every room, sometimes six inches deep, sometimes sixty feet deep. It was an ever shifting sea of sand under the earth. Waterfalls of sand poured in great pillars from holes in the ceiling, making the sand roil and crest like waves in a stormy sea, but this only happened in the big chambers that had three or more sand waterfalls.

Most of the chambers had a light covering of sand, but many were unique and full of a wild splendor. They passed one that had only a lip of solid ground along one wall, below it roiled a tremendous sea of sand with five sand waterfalls as big around as ancient oak trees. In the center of the chamber yawned the maw of a giant whirlpool that stretched down into the depths, always consuming, always belching up a cloud of dust and grit that filled the entire room like an earthy mist. Another chamber they came across was slanted like a ramp, winding around in a circle. Sand rolled down it like a river, up to their knees. They hugged the outside wall and trudged up it slowly and with infinite care. Another room they passed was like a tall cylinder, with bridges of stone arcing throughout it. Waterfalls of sand fell and bounced from one bridge to another, finally collecting on the floor where they fell through a series of small tubular passages, set where the walls met the floor, to disappear below. They climbed from one bridge to another, tied together for safety. Countless times one of them would fall only to be saved by the other two. The sand would erratically fall down the chamber, sometimes in spurts with unpredictable wads of it hitting places at random. This was caused by the bridges themselves, which were more numerous at the top of the cylinder, thus causing much of the sand to separate and bounce. They left that cave gladly behind without looking back. Every cave presented a new challenge and every cave could be their last if they weren't careful enough.

It was increasingly feeling like a series of trials. They took a break in the newest chamber, one which had a calm floor of sand that they walked across very carefully. Flau led the way, with Quel and Saida holding her arms as she poked the ground ahead with her feet to make sure it was only a few feet deep and not yards deep or even miles. Their progress had been slow and now they broke their fast in the middle of this silent chamber, the sand for once not flowing like a river, but remaining as sand should: perfectly still.

They took the gloura's warning to heart and were trying to get through this nightmarish and hostile place as fast as they safely could. It was no easy task to accomplish.

Li'renga stood looking out of the hole in the chasm wall. It was the closest part of Vi'schruk that still existed next to the chasm. When the tower had fallen into the chasm it had rested above it had also torn out a large section of the cavern wall with it, exposing the hallway Li'renga now stood in and automatically making it the closest site in the remaining city near the grave of their god, their elder brain. Li'renga would probably put his mood at seething rage, but he never felt emotion. He had scoured his mind of such dalliances long ago when he was young. The foolishness of his fellow Archons had led to this. It was they who had convinced the elder brain to house itself in a tower virtually floating over the abyss, feeding its ego and their own. Adamantine reinforced stone pillars that had been magically molded out of the chasm wall by some unfortunate svirfneblin druids had proved no match for the one who had obliterated the tower.

Never mind the fact that the chambers directly above and below the elder brain, save for the Three Archons private level, were guarded by a small army of enslaved umber hulks and manticores. And that an elite squadron of illithid psionicists was placed in charge of this small army, with their sole duty being to protect the elder brain from any aggressor. No one had ever imagined someone could destroy the tower from the outside. Literally cutting the support pillars, weakening them, and blowing up the elder brain and the top of the tower. The Archons had built the ramp around the tower so that their servants could attend them without interrupting the elder brain. Their arrogance had allowed a path to be built all the way up the tower that was unguarded! The sheer stupidity had never left Li'renga's mind, but he had been overruled, called paranoid and laughed at.

He took no satisfaction in the deaths of his fellow Archons, he had long ago grown past emotions. Turning away from the exposed hallway's dead end, Li'renga walked back into the city proper and continued on to the outskirts, where he paused to make sure with both his mind and eyes that he wasn't being followed. Then, satisfied no one was watching him in secret, he cast a spell of his own design that unlocked a cunningly hidden door in the stone floor that slid back to reveal a spiral staircase winding down out of sight. He closed the door behind him, making sure no one ever found his secret storehouse and laboratory. His few living specimens shrank back in their cages as he passed. He found what he sought on a back bookshelf: an ancient scroll that was beginning to decay. He made a mental note to copy it down again before it became too brittle to use and unfurled it, seeking the right keyword for his summoning spell.

Finding what he sought, he opened a dimensional door, which because of his many warding spells could only be done from inside this secret room. He had made it so no one could open a door to his private retreat, if anyone had known about it that is. Stepping through the door he appeared miles and miles away from the city, in one of many small caves he had prepared for just such a purpose as this. There were no doors to allow access to this small cave, only someone who knew where it was exactly on the Prime Material Plane could teleport themselves into it and even if they did know where it was his many wardings prevented them from doing so unless they were in his secret lab. A triple layer of protection always served best, he thought. Li'renga quadruple checked the summoning circle that covered the center of this room's floor, making sure there were no broken lines or bindings. Then he renewed each line three times over, making them strong and potent again. Finally, after all of his preparations, Li'renga began to cast his summoning spell, which was an involved process. Into it he threw the true name of the demon he sought, calling it from it's netherworldy domain and into his. A dark cloud of what appeared to be pitch black smoke coalesced within the borders of the circle and a monstrous, terrifying form stepped forth from the smoke. It was something every psionicist feared, though they dreamed it never find them: a cerebrilith.

This was a type of demon that used psionics to further its already prodigious power, making it a truly fearsome and dreadful opponent. Cerebriliths usually stood at about eight feet tall, with a hugely swollen brain, its bulging and elongated skull sweeping back to connect seamlessly with its hunched back and a spinal column with ridges. Its fanged mouth extends from underneath a protruding formation of bone that was its brow. While its head may have seemed overly large the rest of its body seemed almost emaciated it was so thin. It was coated in a thin layer of slime, much like an illithid. It had overly long arms, slightly longer than its legs. Its elbows had sharp extensions of bone that could easily be used as knives. And its legs were clawed, with three foreclaws and a knife pointed extension of bone as its heel, which was not quite a rear claw. It had no apparent eyes, only a humanoid jaw with the vast elongated skull that joined with its neck seamlessly. A long snake like tongue darted and swished in the air between its jaws.

"Whyyyyy have youuu summoned mee Li'rengaaa?"it hissed in an otherworldly voice.

"I have someone I want you to kill Vomer," Li'renga said in his watery voice, invoking the cerebrilith's true name. The demon remained silent, so Li'renga continued. "Vi'schruk has been dealt a mortal blow. Our floating tower and our elder brain have both been annihilated in a single day by one man. Bi'xre and Z'Thurun, along with most of my community have died in the attack as well." The cerebrilith shifted from one foot to another. This was big news, for the illithid community of Vi'schruk was old and well known, even in the Abyss. Vomer had been serving the Archons of Vi'schruk since its conception, nearly one thousand five-hundred years ago. Not only that, but the current Three Archons, made up of three of the most powerful ulitharid psionicists and sorcerers in hundreds of years had been defeated for Vi'schruk to fall. This was indeed big news.

After letting the gravity of his words sink in Li'renga continued. "I want you to track him down and kill him and all who he travels with." The ulitharid paused. "He set out from Vi'schruk eighteen days ago with two companions, both women."

"Youuu havvee no otherr desirresss?" Vomer asked.

"None, save that you make their deaths slow." Li'renga disengaged the summoning circle's wards, allowing Vomer freedom on the Material Plane. The cerebrilith galloped off without a word, opening a dimensional door with his psionic powers and vanishing from sight. He would follow his summoner's will, carrying out his objective expertly. Li'renga didn't feel any emotions, he was beyond such things. If he did feel anything its was a sense of justice earned for wrongs committed against his own kind. They didn't stand a chance against a cerebrilith. They would be putty in the palms of his clawed hands.

Flau pointed up at a giant jiggling stalactite. "I'm not walking under that," she declared.

Quel nodded sagaciously. "A wise choice," he mused aloud. "But what course do you suggest madam navigator?"

She pointed over at a tiny ledge of stone that ran along the entire right hand wall. "That seems like the only safe route," she said.

Saida nodded her head in agreement. "Seems so."

Quel nodded sagaciously again, stroking his chin with one hand. "I find myself agreeing with your hypothesis."

The girls rolled their eyes.

They were standing in what they believed was one of the last chambers in this underground, sandy, hellish, amazing path. For the last day and a half they had encountered shafts of light shining down out of the ceilings of most of the rooms they traversed. Pure sunlight to them had seemed like something from another world, and in a way it was. The Underdark had many places so far from the surface that most of its inhabitants had never seen the light of day. For Saida, Flau and Quel it had been months since they had seen the sun. Long enough to begin to forget what it looked like.

Now they stood in a chamber pierced by no less than thirty different shafts of light of varying sizes. A bridge of stone, wider than most, extended from one side of the chamber to the other. It arced just like a suspension bridge. Over it hung a forest of stalactites, one of whom was the size of Odin's spear gungnir. It looked like it was loose and added credence to this idea by shaking every now and again. The rest of the room was full of sand, with as many sand waterfalls as shafts of light. No less than three sand whirlpools beckoned to them from below, each one wide enough to swallow them all whole. The only other navigable path was a ledge around the right hand side of the room, perpendicular to the entrance our trio had come through.

This ledge was narrow and looked old and crotchety, as ledges go, but it was the only other way through besides the land bridge in peril by the gungnir stalactite. Flau led the way across the ledge, Quel supporting her under her left armpit and Saida doing the same for him. They kept their backs to the wall and were all tied together at the waist as an extra precaution. Flau's tapping feet experimentally exploring the ledge ahead of her and the incessant sound of falling sand were the only background music to be had in that place. The time seemed to stagger by, so slow as to be painful.

"You know Quel," Saida said, breaking the silence. "You could have just teleported us all across this room, or flown us."

"I can't," Quel said. "My powers aren't back yet, I'm still fried."

"A likely excuse," Saida said jovially, whether she was teasing or serious was hard to tell.

"Hey, I'm trying to concentrate here," Flau said, annoyed.

"Yes ma'am," Quel and Saida said in unison, surprising one another.

Flau inched them along the ledge, and after ten centuries they arrived at the opposite end of the chamber. They had survived another of the seemingly endless trials. They were actually getting used to these ordeals. Still no signs of life, besides the gloura, since their escape from the mind flayer city. Not even the signs of livings things had they crossed. No scatt, tracks or other defining things to mark the presence of living things. Although at first Quel, Saida and Flau had not been overly concerned with the lack of life in this region they had slowly become more and more aware of the extreme absence of life, making this a dead land (If the few agressive skeletons they had encountered earlier weren't enough of a giveaway.)

Another long passage winded through solid rock in front of them, its sides rubbed smooth by the passage of sand over the eons. Time moved both slowly and quickly as they walked. The subterranean corridor came to a fork, with one path leading up and another leading down. Sharply down. It wasn't hard for them to choose the one that led up. After following it for a dozen miles it began to rise radically. Then, after their calf muscles began to struggle, they arrived at a landing. The landing opened onto a positively gargantuan room.

"Wow..." Flau said in awe.

The room had to be at least six hundred feet long and at least that high, and its width was around four hundred feet at the very least. But the most astounding feature of this cavern was that every surface had been carved. Murals of fantastic beastmen and depictions of frightening monsters covered the walls. The sheer size of these pieces of wall art was daunting. A five hundred foot tall fresco of a leopard man holding a bloody sword and roaring at the viewer while beheading a twenty headed snake would make anyone feel something. Possibly fear. Possibly disgust. But most likely a combination of the two.

Reds and yellows had been used the most, with rare splashes of brilliant blues and gregarious greens thrown in. Quel, Flau and Saida stood there for many minutes, taking in the room and its visceral art. Some of the frescoes had been sculpted and carved into the wall, giving them dimension as well as a semblance of life from the paints. These were only four in number and each one was a beastman, save for the last which was neither a beastman, nor a beast. Over the cavern entrance our trio had arrived in stood a woman with the head of a horse. To the right of our trio, perpendicular from the entrance they stood at, was a man with the head of a black leopard. To their left was a man with the head of an elephant, his was a hard visage to ignore. And directly across from them was something hard to comprehend. It looked like a woman, but had the body of a wave of water. It seemed to be reaching out at fleeing people, small as ants compared to it, but it had no hands, only the foam that crested its wavelike body. It seemed to have eyes red as blood, but those had to be twin stars shining bright behind it.

A great battle was depicted on the walls of the room, between gods in the guise of beasts and demons in their true monstrous forms. The art was very old, faded almost to ruin. Large chunks of stone had fallen off many of the carvings, especially the elephant man's tusks and the tip of the horse woman's nose.

Shafts of light came in from both walls, meeting in the middle of the room. They were arrayed perfectly so that they never touched one another and squares of blinding light would almost touch, like a checkerboard or chessboard. If one was to count them, no easy task, they would find 364, one for every day of the year except for the Winter Solstice. But only you and I know of this, Quel, Saida and Flau had no idea.

Opposite our trio there was a staircase that led onward. At the top of the staircase there was a small landing that continued with another tunnel opening. It was the only way in or out of the room, unless you were a bird and could fly out of the room through the shafts that light poured through. This was apparently a well known fact to birds, many of whom were nesting in crevices and cracks in the walls. Their raucous calls echoed eternally in that eldritch hall, adding a slice of Mother Nature's irony to the edifices of man. If this was manmade and not some construction by another race of beings. This was Toril after all, humans were only one of the many races on this planet. Still, this _felt_ more human than anything else and there were no depictions of elves, dwarves or orcs.

Flau took the lead, walking across the floor towards the shafts of light that covered the entire center of the room. Quel darted after her and grabbed her right elbow, yanking her backwards to stand next to him.

"Hey! What was that for?!" she exclaimed.

"Don't walk forwards just yet," Quel said as he scanned the room.

"Oh no," Saida said in dismay as she walked to stand next to them. "Booby traps?"

"Boobied," Quel affirmed. "_Very_ boobied."

Pressure plates were barely visible all across the floor in front of them. Knowing better than to poke the cobblestones one by one, Quel searched for a way around the trapped flooring instead. It would be so simple if he could just fly them all over to the other end of the room. Instead he had them avoid the beams of light and walk around the edge of the room, slowly and carefully making their way to the other end. The enormity of the room pressed on their minds as they crept along the wall. The figures on the wall watched them go past and though they didn't move their eyes tracked Quel, Saida and Flau across the room.

They got across the room without setting off any traps. They were climbing the stairs when Flau set off a trap by inadvertently putting too much weight on her back foot as she stepped upward. This caused the whole staircase to shift down two degrees before stopping. A small cloud of dust rose up from the stairs. Examining what had happened they deduced that the trap wa so old it had frozen in the middle of its task. Looking down they saw a pit waiting to swallow them whole at the foot of the stairs. They would have slid down at breakneck speed to plummet down into whatever lay in that pit. Thankfully that hadn't happened and they continued on to the top of the stairs, this time at a slower pace due to the precarious nature of the stairs. They crawled on their hands and knees just to be doubly safe.

Once at the top of the stairs they turned to look out on the giant hall. They left through the shadowy door at the back of the landing without regret. This place was more dangerous than its beauty was worth. The doorway at the top of the stairs connected to a series of inclined tunnels that were a mini labyrinth. Our trio climbed up these passages carefully. They had no stairs, but slowly became more steep the longer they climbed. After about an hour of climbing and backtracking to find the right way they arrived at another big room, this one unadorned compared to the last one, but definitely man made as well. A sight of incomparable beauty greeted them on the opposite side of the room. After spending countless days in the bowels of the earth they had finally returned to the light of day. It shone through a jagged hole in the opposite wall.

There was a disparity here. One wall, the outside wall, was rough stone while the wall facing the path they had taken through the Underdark was carved by hand. It was an odd room, one where the untamed nature of life contrasted with the ordered lines of masons. They didn't see the carved figure on the back wall behind them, hanging over the door. It resembled a man with eight arms, but just as easily could have been a too human spider.

The light called to them and they answered, rushing out to greet the day.


	16. 15 Lies and Umbrage

_**Chapter Fifteen: Lies and Umbrage**_

**Toril, the Crystal Chamber, December 13th, 1391 a.c.**

It was not sunlight. They had stepped through into a vast chamber ten times the size of the one they had just passed through. It was so large that the top half seemed to be obscured in mist. It was a good ten football field lengths long and about three to four high. The room was domed, egg shaped and artificially constructed. Every wall was adorned with inlaid frescoes and carvings, these being far darker in thought than the previous room's. Depictions of monsters eating people and daunting figures with water, earth, flame and wind enshrouding them protecting and fighting the monsters adorned the walls. They were frightening frescos to look upon.

The light that had blinded them, making it look like sunlight, came off of a giant purple crystal floating in mid air in the center of the room. This crystal had to be as large as a mini mountain. Sunlight shined down from above, through a hole in the ceiling that was large, big enough for two elephants to fall through, but compared to the rest of the room it was a tiny thing.

They stood momentarily stunned, lost in wonder over what they were looking at. They stood on a plateau. It was small and hugged the wall for only a couple of feet. There were stairs carved out of stone leading down to the floor, a sheer drop on either side of the staircase and no rail to hold on to. Our trio took these stairs carefully, all the while looking upon the giant room. The floor was filled with sand, some of it collected into mini dunes, but most of it laying flat along the floor. The bases of the walls had frescoes of the ocean all along their lengths and it was a murky brownish, reddish ocean appalling to the eye with no fish or other life inhabiting it.

When they reached the floor they all heard a sound echo throughout the room, but couldn't agree on what it had sounded like. Quel thought it was a drum beating once; Saida thought it was a flute trilling one note; and Flau thought it was a harp string plucked once.

What they heard next was something they all agreed upon: snickering laughter.

"Welcome to my humble abode," a grand voice echoed imperiously, exotic in its lilt.

They all looked around, unable to put a source to the voice. It was Quel who finally realized the only thing other than them in the room beside sand and more sand was the crystal.

So he started to talk to it. "What are you?" he asked.

"Not very polite are you humans?" said the crystal, light beating in it with its every word. "I'm a genie, here to grant three wishes to whoever frees me."

"Nice try, but I'm not in the wrong frame of mind to allow some eldritch being, who was imprisoned to begin with, freedom," Quel retorted.

"You've been imprisoned for how long to come up with a bald faced lie like that?" Saida said incredulously appalled. She, after all, was from the mighty Ctarl Ctarl's, who claimed to be immortal and lived an undetermined span of years. She was older than she looked.

"You've got it all wrong!" the genie said. "I was wrongfully imprisoned by an evil caliph. He put me in here because I made all of his wives ugly as old sahuagin and turned his favorite concubine into a horse."

"So far you're not making a strong case," Quel said dryly.

"But it was my master who wished for these things!" the genie said with woe. "Because they did not break the Three Laws I was obliged to grant them." It grew very quiet, its next words barely above a whisper. "Never would I have guessed how it would end up, that I'd be imprisoned in crystal and buried here."

"I say we continue on and leave him here," Saida said, turning to walk around the crystal. "Lesson two is never trust anything imprisoned, they will resort to anything to get out."

"Hey I'm not a thing!" gripped the genie. "I have a name you rude girl!" The genie paused in its words, then it began to glow intermittently as it giggled. "I don't think I'll share with you how this room is booby trapped," it said mischievously. "Why not take a break and visit with me for a while? I'm sure I can entertain you three Outlanders."

"Farlander this, Outlander that!" Saida said angrily. "You backwater people don't know when to quit! I've had it with all of this!" She dropped her pack and ran to stand right in front of the crystal, or below it as it was floating a good thirty feet off the floor. "Either you tell me how we get out of here safely or I break you into a million pieces!" she yelled, a primal yowl escaping her throat as she stamped her right foot.

"I think she's upset," Flau whispered to Quel covertly. "Maybe you should do something?" she said with some intensity, gesturing with her head towards Saida and the imprisoned genie.

"Oh come now little girl, you can't even hope to reach me all the way up here," the genie said with fatherly tones, like he was gently scolding her. "Be reason-aaahhhh!"

His sentence broke off into a yell of surprise as Saida leaped forty feet into the air and clamped down with her hands, feet and teeth to get a grip on the crystal. She began to kick at the crystal like a cat will, legs working furiously. At first nothing happened, but then small cracks began to appear and tiny shards began to fall like sharp rain.

"Help!" wailed the genie. "HEEEELP! Oh please help!"

Quel sighed, then teleported up next to Saida, yanked her off with some effort, gravity helping as he fell by her, and plummeted back to the ground. The wild cat-girl raged over his left shoulder, crying out curses in Ctarl Ctarl at the imprisoned genie. They hit the sandy earth and lay there, stunned. Saida rolled off of Quel. He had tried to roll when he hit the ground, only to belatedly realize the ground was about three feet under the sand. His aborted maneuver to roll when he hit the ground turned into a painful faceplant instead, Saida only took the brunt of the fall on her derriere.

Flau ran over and helped Quel back up to his feet. He stood shakily for a moment.

"Thank you young lord!" the genie said. "You have no idea how grateful I am to you. Anything your heart desires I will grant to you. All you have to do is set me free."

"Can it," Quel said, looking pained and annoyed. "We don't have time for this. There are no traps in here, we're leaving." He started walking towards what looked like the exit: a duplicate staircase on the opposite side of the room.

"How can you be so sure?" the genie said, mischief plain in its voice. "What Would you be Willing to Wager if you're Wrong?" it trilled in a sing song voice.

"Gag me," Saida said. "You dirty liar, there's nothing here but sand and more sand."

Flau, Quel and Saida all gathered together and began to walk towards the exit, the genie pleading, cajoling and warning them the whole way.

Finally it had caught up to them. Finally it could sense them closeby, barely a hundred yards in front of it. A quick dimensional door to teleport towards them would be the end of it. It was dangerous for a normal psionicist to open a dimensional doorway without knowing for certain where the other end would appear. Cerebriliths were not normal psionicists.

It created the doorway and leaped through it...

When they were just beginning to climb the stairs two things happened. One was Flau stepped on a pressure plate(Again.) and caused it to activate, gears began turning in the walls, conspicuously loud. The second one was a sound made Quel turn, as he always turns at odd noises, he saw an ugly creature leaping through a dimensional doorway right at them. It was so bizarre looking and inherently evil in its appearance he immediately knew they were in serious trouble.

It was over eight feet tall, its brain was hugely swollen and its skull joined with its hunched back seamlessly. It appeared to have no upper head, such as a nose, forehead and eyes, but its giant brain took the place of this area of its head, giving it only a vaguely humanoid monstrous jaw that protruded from beneath its bony brow. Out of this jaw slithered a snake like tongue that darted through the air experimentally. Its spine was ridged, with the vertebrae sticking out sharply, like spikes almost. It was coated in a viscous slime that gave it a sheen in the light. Aside from its overly large head it looked emaciated, but was actually very slim with tones of corded muscles on its frame. It had claws for feet, like a dinosaur's, and its arms were long, too long, with long clawed fingers. Its arms and legs had spiked bony protrusions on the elbows and the back of the heels. It ran at them on all fours, but reared up to two feet to fight.

"Behind us!" Quel yelled in dread as it got closer.

Saida and Flau spun around, on guard. Just then a loud mechanical click sounded and the walls opened up near the ceiling and sand began to pour into the room at an alarming rate.

The creature impacted with the bottom of the stairs, destroying that section and shooting up into the air hundreds of pieces of debris. All three companions flinched as they felt their confidence began to slip away and their might being sapped. Saida and Flau leaped off of the stairs to land in the sand. Quel charged the psionic creature only to see it raise its right hand and point at him, a ray of energy shooting out to hit him square in the stomach. He immediately felt a deep biting cold suffuse his body and fell sideways off of the staircase before he could regain control of his body.

Saida joined her fists together and sent a combined shock wave at the creature. It didn't even budge as the wave passed over it. Instead it looked at Saida and the three companions heard a voice grumble in their heads, followed by an intense psychic shriek that left them all stunned and numbed.

The creature then chose to raise its hand and stretch them towards Quel and Flau on one side of the staircase and Saida on the other, all three were still clutching their heads, trying to recover from the shriek. Saida became weightless and began to float upwards within a sphere of impermeable energy until the thing sent her flying to smack painfully into the side of the stairs. A small vortex of wind snaked out from the creature's other hand and shot out at Quel and Flau.

A wind attack Quel could deal with. He pointed Kaze no Koe back at the creature and sent the vortex to rebound back on it. The creature was tossed violently through the air to smack a hard glancing blow on the floating crystal before it fell, landing near the wall, where it was promptly buried in the flood of sand that was quickly spreading outwards from the walls.

"You can't leave me to die here!" the genie said as its crystal wobbled ever so slightly from the thing's blow.

Quel looked over at Saida, silently asking a question. She sighed in disgust, though it was a bit forced.

"Go ahead," she said in resignation. "Release the whiny bugger."

The genie was so pleased it ignored her rudeness. "Thank you! Oh thank youuuuuu!" it sang.

"How do I free you?" asked Quel.

"You must say my true name followed by 'I release you from White Agate's bondage!'" said the genie, its crystal light fairly filling the entire room with its glow.

"Waitaminute, who's White Agate?" Quel asked.

Just then the creature exploded from the sand, flying through the air, shrieking with its own mouth instead of with its mind, tongue flapping in the breeze. It was headed directly towards Quel.

"That part doesn't matter!" cried the imprisoned genie. "Just release me before you all die!"

"I don't like your tone!" yelled Saida as she met the thing in mid air, kicking it back across the room. "And what makes you think we're going to die, huh?" she said testily as she fell back and landed in a crouch on the floor.

The sand was now past their knees and rising another foot every minute and a half.

"Alright, I'm sorry for doubting you!" the genie cried. "Now could you please release me before I die in here!? I'm just a defenseless spirit!"

The creature screamed in rage, turning to glare at Quel, Saida and Flau, if it had eyes that is. Instead its gazeless stare was unsettling for other reasons.

"Quel! Saida!" Flau yelled. "Buy me time to release him!"

Quel and Saida nodded, both charging the thing. It charged them on all fours, screaming its rage. Saida leaped at it, her feet kicking up a high plume of dust and sand as she shot at it like a rocket. She impacted with an invisible shield right in front of its head and bounced off to land limply in the sand. Quel, forewarned by her blunder, managed to twist his body to fall over the disk, his sword coming in at the thing's head.

They impacted explosively, Quel taking the brunt of the impact. His sword scuffed off of its head, doing no damage. It grabbed him and threw him violently to smash high into the wall, where he fell to the ground and was quickly buried in rising sand. It weighed tons and incapacitated him.

That was when the creature unleashed another psychic shriek. Saida hunched up in a ball, clutching her head. Quel couldn't move, but he did squirm under the sand. He was unable to dig himself out and the sand kept piling up, trapping him further. Flau was just finding out the genie's true name when the shriek hit her hard, dropping her to her knees. She clutched her head trying not to faint. Everyone was even more dazed from the second shriek, Flau and Quel barely cognizant. Saida was just experiencing a gnarly headache, her mental resistance being stronger than theirs.

The thing stopped its shriek, its next attack already in play. An assault to Saida's mental pathways stuttered her mental processes to a grinding halt. She became mind dead, laying there on the ground as good as unconscious. She could breath, she could blink her eyes, but she could do little else while the thing's attention was pressing down on her. Simultaneously it had raised its other hand and sent a swarm of crystal shards spiralling at Flau, who got back on her feet just as the swarm arrived. She was cut hundreds of times and fell to the ground, out of the fight.

A giant explosion of wind sent sand flying in a giant cloud, releasing Quel from his prison and creating a gritty rain.

Quel stood up to his full height and took in the whole room at a calculated glance. His rage began to show in the blue light that shined in his eyes. He wasn't nearly recovered from his ordeal in the mind flayer city, but he was recovered enough to do some good damage and buy time for his friends.

As the thing turned to attack him he teleported behind it and stabbed at its back, making it stumble. It had on one of those psionic shields against damage, making his every attack get absorbed and added to its reservoir of psionic energy instead of doing it any harm.

That was fine by Quel, he had a plan to counter this, one he had been thinking of through the whole long trek away from the mind flayer city.

It swiped at him with its powerful arms, but he was already gone, standing on the staircase they had come down. He raised his left hand and a point of red light began to coalesce around his pointer finger, condensing over and over again at an alarming rate. The creature exhaled a breath of acid, which spewed forth, blocking Quel's sight of the creature. It then turned insubstantial, becoming ethereal. It did not know what his attack was, but it could feel the power of it from where it was standing and did not want to get hit by something of that caliber.

All in all it took Quel three seconds to charge his attack and for the creature to spew out a cloud of acid and fade away. By the time he fired his cero blast, which was a high powered energy beam attack, the thing had vanished and his attack passed right through it, exploding at the bottom of the stairs on the other side of the room and creating a giant explosion that shook the room and blocked out that half of the room in a cloud of sand and smoke.

Flau's form vanished in the cloud. Thankfully his effort wasn't wasted entirely: the creature had let slip its hold on Saida's mind, allowing her to return to consciousness.

Her anger flared red hot, her face becoming beat red, her hair bristling, her tail twitching in extreme wrath and her clothes rippling from the energy escaping her body. The thing reappeared, taking special note of Saida as Quel fell to his knees, gasping from his exertion. He definitely wasn't fully recovered yet.

It raised both its hands and sent out a cone of electric energy that hit Saida like a wave, electrocuting her and frying her. Her hair stood on end as she toppled over backwards.

It turned back to Quel, smiling evilly as it leisurely prepared to finish him off. Before it could do that Quel waved Kaze no Koe, sending a strong gust of wind to slam into it from the side, and kicking up a cloud of dust to cover it. The stairs directly above Quel were barraged by telekinetic force, cracking them and sending loose pieces of stone flying into the air. Quel leaped over the left side of the staircase to land in sand now up to his mid waist. They didn't have much time left.

The genie had stopped crying out, whether from fear or despair was beside the point.

Suddenly, and without any warning, the creature teleported to appear in front of Quel, its arms raised to slam him into the ground. Quel teleported away before it got a chance to hit him and found it had teleported alongside him. There ensued a mad dance as Quel sought to lose it, only to have it stick to him as they bounced around the room.

They would appear near the ceiling, then at the top of one staircase, in the middle of the room, and then back up at the ceiling again. They traded blows, him with his sword, it with its hands. Quel's blows always bounced off and the thing's blows always drew blood. By the time a full minute of this had elapsed Quel was covered in bloody gashes and cuts and the creature was still unscathed. Quel was breathing heavily, while it was hardly struggling.

The chase ended in the middle of the room, under the floating crystal. It had grabbed onto Quel's right ankle and whipped him into the air before slamming him to the ground. He lay there dazed and near the end of his energy reserve.

Just then a giant cat barreled into the creature as it loomed over Quel. They both rolled and fought in a ball of fangs and claws, scratching and biting and kicking and screaming at each other. Halfway across the floor the creature suddenly grew larger, growing to be twice its normal size. It tossed Saida off of it, stood up to its now daunting sixteen foot tall height and looked down on her small, yet still large, cat form.

The creature raised its giant foot and stomped the ground, unleashed a large shock wave that traveled across the room, knocking Quel over. Cat-Saida leaped over the wave and then bounded towards the thing, landing on its left leg and tearing into it viciously. Her claws and teeth had no effect, but did distract the creature from attacking anyone else.

The creature melted away, turning into a shadow form of itself and vanishing into the surroundings. Cat-Saida looked everywhere, eyes scanning the room hungrily. Her feral instincts ruling her motives.

The creature's shadow detached from the ceiling over her and plummeted towards her. It was as silent as death on black wings. Quel saw it falling and that Cat-Saida did not. He teleported next to her, grabbed her despite her yowling protests and reappeared with her at the top of the staircase that they had used to enter the room. The majority of the staircase had been obliterated by his cero blast, and he stood at the edge of all that was left, a sheer drop directly in front of him.

Cat-Saida leaped down to the ground, a thirty foot drop, easily. Then she leapt at the creature as it turned to face her. She landed on its face and began to claw, still to no effect. Quel decided to help her, so he cast a piercing Kidō spell.

"_Hado #4 Byakurai,"_ he said matter-of-factly, pointing at the thing. Blue energy shot out from his index finger in a tiny shock wave and then formed a concentrated bolt of pale blue lightning that hit the thing right in the center of its chest.

The bolt did no damage, but a second later the creature shrieked in surprise as Cat-Saida's claws and fangs finally began to dig in. She tore large gashes in its face before it managed to grab her and toss her off, ripping more of its flesh off along with her exodus. It screamed even more in pain and anger, growling deep down in its throat as it glared without eyes at Cat-Saida as she landed on her feet, tensed and ready to go another round.

Both Quel and Saida had their minds assaulted, but this was unlike any of the other assaults. Those had been designed to subdue them, this was aimed at destroying their minds. In the silence of this battle of minds it was a different sort of struggle. The creature couldn't destroy their minds easily as they were no ordinary people. Theirs was a strength and fortitude that required the thing to expose itself to harm them.

In this odd environment of battle Quel and Saida, even in her beast state, snapped somehow. Their minds briefly joined as one and they repelled the thing's advances. It recoiled in shock and pain, its psychic form slammed by two combined minds as one. For the first time in its life it was stunned, unable to form a quick counter attack.

A miracle had just taken place, one that was not supposed to be possible: Quel and Saida had joined their consciousnesses together. That had never been heard of before and was so unquantifiable as to be too strange to fathom. They had no idea of what they had done, barely had they even understood what was going on around and within them when it had happened, so disoriented were they by the thing's psychic assault.

True fear touched upon the creature at that moment. For one born of psionics-always using psionics to dominate and abuse others, to further its goals and ambitions, to create chaos and be an instrument of destruction-it was frightening to the core of it's being that someone could best it at it's own game. Two people seemingly incapable of even a telekinetic shove had harmed it where any damage was long lasting, usually permanent, and almost impossible to completely remove. Fear quickly gave way to denial: they had been lucky, it must have been a fluke. Denial quickly gave way to rage: they had dared to harm it, dared to resist it! They would suffer for their foolishness. The thing resorted to using subterfuge to cover itself and give it time to think.

That was when the lights went out, a field of great darkness blocking out all traces of illumination. Quel was left blind, with only his ears and nose to tell him what was happening and still suffering disorientation from the psionic attack he wasn't functioning at his best, nor even half of his best. Being transformed into a giant beast form helped Saida locate the creature and land on its face again, despite her queasiness from the lingering effects of the psionic attack. It screamed more in surprise than anything as she began to tear into its face again. She tore out even bigger pieces of it as it thrashed around on the floor, with her on its face. Finally after doing this for almost a minute the creature tried a sensible tactic.

The it used its psionic powers to forcefully make Cat-Saida eject all the air in her lungs. She gasped and hacked, struggling to breath and slackened in her efforts to tear it apart. The thing used this opportunity to throw her off of it. She hit the floating crystal with a meaty thwack and fell limp to the ground where she nearly blacked out, her vision dancing.

The creature could see in the darkness it had created, of that Quel was sure. He leaped through the air, summoning an updraft to lift him high above it. His target was the general area where he sensed the creature to be. What he actually encountered was a forearm smash into his chest that sent him on his merry way back the way he had come. He bounced off the stairs three times as he shot up them to smash into the top of the doorway leading out of the room. He fell back to the ground, near death.

It had seen Quel coming from the top of the stairs, his attack had been effortlessly turned against him. All three of them were down and out, it had won. The impenetrable darkness fell away, revealing the chamber again in all its dimness.

"I, Flau Daughter of Nameless Parents, release al-Abir from his imprisonment by White Agate, servant of the Grand Caliph Khalil al-Assad al-Zahir!" cried out a voice in the stillness. It was Flau, standing off to the side in the shadows, bloody and wounded, but still alive. She got her entire long winded sentence out before she was assaulted by a giant cone of mind numbing energy, much like a mind flayer's, only ten times more powerful. She dropped without a sound.

But she had done enough. The crystal in the center of the room glowed so brightly it would blind anyone foolish enough to look upon its last moments. Then it exploded in a hail of shards that flew all over the entire chamber.

"I am _FREE_!" roared the figure within this storm of light and crystal. He fell to the ground slowly and stood up to his full 6'3 height. He was a strange being, half of his form cloaked in darkness and the other half bathed in brilliant light. A pattern of lines was etched into his entire body. These lines glowed with energy, a dark unholy light where the darkness sheltered him and a radiant holy light where the light emblazoned his form. His eyes had no pupils and also glowed white, a neutral white. He wore no shirt, but had on traditional Zakharan pantaloons, which billowed out from his hips to become baggy before shrinking back to join, form-fitting, with his ankles. He had on nice white slippers too, with the shoes curling up at the toe, like cliched elf shoes, only less curved than that.

"Demon," he said into the silence, no trace of fear or worry in his voice. "You are threatening my benefactors, leave at once or prepare to die."

The demon, for that was what the thing was, almost laughed out loud over this cretin's demands. Full of mirth, it targeted him with a psychic attack, only to be rebuffed and take psychic damage from attacking him. It stood there in shock, its surprise and pain very apparent.

Quel managed to open his eyes and look up to see what was happening. He was surprised and would have gasped if he wasn't in so much pain. The imprisoned genie was in fact a genasi, a half elemental and half mortal being. Usually this meant a genie had procreated with a human, elf, etc, but it could be other elemental beings too. What was more this genasi looked like he was an abyssal genasi, a very rare subtype that was reviled and feared for being touched by the elemental chaos.

"Your mind tricks won't work on a voidsoul, cerebrilith," the genasi said casually, arrogantly. Then he winked out of existence. He reappeared a few seconds later in a different spot ten feet to the right. Before the demon could attack him again he attacked, by becoming sand and gathering all the sand in the room about himself like a cloak. This amorphous mass of sand fell on the demon like a tidal wave, or an avalanche and buried it under ten tons of sand.

A new giant dune had been created in the room. The genasi disentangled himself from this dune and prepared for his next attack.

The demon reappeared a few seconds later after having to briefly phase shift to another dimension to escape the sandy coffin. It immediately fired from all its outstretched fingers green rays of energy that the genasi effortlessly dodged, dancing to one side. He then called upon the spirits of the wastes and unleashed a devastating spell on the demon.

A dreadful wind, scraping sand, boiling rock and suffocating ash appeared out of nowhere as the spirits of the desert answered the call of the genasi and pummeled the demon, making it stagger back. Its form began to take terrible damage, the wind battering at it and keeping it off balance, the boiling rock searing its flesh and bone, the ash suffocating it and the sand rubbing it raw all over. It was battered and disoriented by the unexpected and powerful attack.

The genasi used this opportunity to run at the demon, tackling it to the ground. Then he changed into another form, one that made the demon cry out in agony and filled the room with heat, a reddish light and the dying screams of the thing.

The genasi had taken the form of magma and had buried the demon entirely in his molten liquid form. The agony was too much and a thick black smoke began to leak out of the molten heap: the demon was dissipating, forced back to his home in the lower planes. Soon it was over, the demon having faded away and the genasi having returned to his corporeal form. Silence returned to the room, now more than two thirds of the way filled with sand. Soon everything would be buried and forgotten in the sand, soon this room would be but a memory.

They were all alive, though in various states of near death. Flau was cut up so badly and had lost so much blood that it had taken a lot of effort to heal her. None of her cuts were deep, but pulling shards of crystal out of her combined with closing up all the wounds magically, one by one, had taken a lot of time. She was left barely worse for wear by the end. Paler from blood loss, but nothing she couldn't recover from in time. Saida had suffered only a minor concussion, thanks in part to her thick skull and even thicker determination. Aside from that she had numerous scuffs and bruises that required little attention. Hers was the least of it. Quel had so many bruised bones it was ridiculous. He could barely move at first, but his recovery rate was faster than a normal human's, so within a week he was walking, albeit with a hitch in his step. They all had suffered from psionic attacks and those wounds would heal differently for each of them. Time would heal those wounds. Their healing had been administered to by the genasi, who knew a few healing spells and other less effective cantrips that eased their pains.

His name was Abir and he was a genasi, though an unusual one. He refused to tell his story, but Quel could see by watching his fight with the demon that he was no ordinary genasi. He was a genasi tempest, one who could call upon more than one element to use. That alone made him rarer than you could possibly imagine, like encountering a tasmanian tiger that could breath fire and fart ice. From watching the battle Quel could tell he had used at least three elemental manifestations, one of them of the abyssal genasi subtype. He would answer no questions, and grew affronted when they asked anything about his past. Questions like "Why were you imprisoned?" and "Where are you from?" would make him clam up with a glare faster than a roadrunner flees from a coyote.

He did apologize for deceiving them with his false story about granting wishes and being punished for them. He explained it had been born of desperation, but his audience was not in the mood to buy any more of his stories. Needless to say they were off to a rocky start.

The sand filled the chamber very quickly and it was the genasi who found them and carried them out of there. He carried them all out into the sunlight. Past the staircase out of the crystal chamber they had only one long hallways filled to bursting with more booby traps before they arrived in an anteroom to the mad copy of the Temple of Doom. From the anteroom there was a staircase that led up and out onto a secluded tropical beach.

This was where they rested up and healed for four and a half days, eating the last of their meager supplies. They couldn't ask for a better climate to recover in. But all of this paled in comparison to their sense of accomplishment: they had reached Zakhara.

They had made it. The Land of Fate lay before them and the mystery of the caravan to Candlekeep, almost forgotten in the long months of misery under the earth, was foremost in their minds in those days of recovery.

Now all they needed to do was find out where such a caravan was bound for. Al-Qadim, the Land of Fate, also called Zakhara, was not a small land. It was immense and covered in sand and secrets.

It could take them a long time to find what they sought.


	17. 16 The Look Before the Leap

**Chapter Sixteen: The Look Before the Leap**

**Toril, The Corsair Domains, December 18th, 1391 a.c.**

The sun stung at first, but the pain quickly faded away. They were astoundingly pale in the morning sunlight, Flau a little more so. They were in a verdant paradise, ocean surf crashing against the warm softness of tropical beaches. Palm trees, ferns and other tropical plants covered the landscape beyond the beach. Their cave exited out amid the sand at the edge of a forest, where a tall cliff blocked out the sky. The cave entrance was barely visible at the base of the cliff, half covered in sand that had piled up in front of it over the years. As far as they could tell no one had come through here in years, decades even. This was an untouched bastion of nature.

A cool breeze blew across the beach, uplifting their spirits. Quel soaked it in and surveyed his motley companions of the road. There was Saida, the cat-girl monk, Flau, the young practical thief and Abir, the rogue and mysterious genasi they had recently saved from his imprisonment in a giant floating crystal.

Abir was more eye catching than all the rest of them put together. He had tan skin with a faint white pattern etched all over his entire body, from his shaven head to his tanned feet. His eyes were pure white, no iris within them. He had a golden sheen to his skin as well, and when he had strong emotion a golden corona would appear around his head and his eyes would change color to match it, as would the white pattern on his skin. This was one side of his nature. While he did indeed possess radiant traits he also was dark to look upon, half of his body in light, half in shadow. This other half looked completely different. He had black skin with lines of light that shined with the uttermost depth of color, like the void itself. Darkness would form a corona around his head, unlike smoke but billowing in a similar fashion. These dual natures warred across his body, sometimes growing to little more than a speck, the other engulfing his entire frame. They danced across his body in a dizzying and maddening display of light and dark, yin and yang.

Abir did not yet know the reason they were traveling to Zakhara. For now they were all planning on traveling together at least to the mainland. Abir had told them he had been sealed in far northern Zakhara, a place known as the Corsair Domains. It was a lawless place filled with unruly, irritable scoundrels. It would be a boisterous place to visit.

One problem had presented itself when they had escaped: Saida had shredded her only set of clothes, leaving her stark naked again. This problem was difficult to resolve, but after Quel ripped off his shirt and pants, leaving him only in a loincloth, Saida was able to rip and tear his clothes then tie them and knot them into a bikini-esque outfit. She looked ridiculous, but they all did. All of them except Abir that is, with his fresh clothes and bravado.

They gathered what little they possessed and headed south, the blazing sun at their left. The forest was not a thick one, though in the beginning they skirted the edge of a swamp that stretched to the horizon along the coast to the east. It took them only two and a half hours of walking to traverse the forest. Once across they found wide open skies and open desert to greet them.

Wearily they set out across the wasteland. The traveling was both hot and desultory. There was nothing to see and nothing to drink to break their thirst. They walked for what felt like years, but was actually only about five hours. The sun was reaching towards the horizon when they arrived at the end of the desert and came upon grasslands. Very dry grasslands. They were unprepared for the terrain they had to travel through, softened by months underground.

Abir laughed heartily at their discomfort. "You should not think yourselves suffering yet, this is not even close to hot. Compared to the Haunted Lands and the Great Anvil specifically, this is but a hot breeze." He laughed some more, his light side dominating his features and giving him a golden glow, fiery as the desert itself.

His words settled them, somewhat, and they continued on displaying far less pain than before. This made Abir laugh as well. Hours passed with nothing new to mark their journey.

"Do you smell that?" Saida asked suddenly, sniffing the air experimentally. "It smells like flowers." She paused in thought. "Pungent flowers."

"I can smell it," affirmed Quel.

They had passed through the dry sections of the grassland and were in the middle of semi-verdant thriving grasslands, unmolested by the arid sandy wastes farther north. The memory of the sun shined beyond the horizon to their right, making the horizon glow varying reds, oranges, yellows and then occasional splashes of purples and light blues at the very edge before the inky blackness of night hounded the light away.

"Your noses are unusually keen," Abir said in reflection. "I smell no flowers. All that greets my nose is the same faint comforting aroma of spice the desert sands give off."

"Don't let it get to you," Flau said to Abir. "These two have noses like hounds."

"I beg your pardon," Saida said in a huff. "I do not have some mongrel's nose. I have the nose of a Ctarl Ctarl lady."

"Mongrel?" Quel said softly, almost as if to himself.

"Ctarl Ctarl?" Abir said grandly. "I have heard scant little about your race, but what I have heard is fascinating!" He was genuinely interested, it seemed. "Please tell me more."

"I would be only happy to!" Saida said enthusiastically. It wasn't often anyone even knew what she was, or that when they did they'd not run for the hills.

They continued on, the smell finally reaching Abir and Flau's less sensitive noses. Then, after the light of the sun had fully expired, they saw a new light ahead. A red light, dreamy in its hue, shined from ahead of them over a hilltop.

Cresting the hill they beheld before them a vast panorama of moist swampland and within its borders rolling fields of red roses, glowing red hot with an inner heat, blanketing the landscape.

It was Abir who broke the silence. "Ah yes, sea roses. I should have known." He smiled grandly, gesturing at the glowing fields. "These are rare in other parts of the world, but in Zakhara and particularly here they are abundant."

"They're very beautiful," Flau breathed in awe.

"And highly dangerous," Abir said gently. "They make a fabulous red dye when harvested properly, but if one is not careful they can kill quite easily."

He had the attention of everyone. "How can they kill?" Quel asked. "Poison?"

"Yes!" Abir said with a laugh. "And their thorns will leap at you, poisoning you and setting you aflame!"

"Sounds nasty," Saida said softly. She had been unusually quiet ever since sharing with Abir.

"Quite," Abir agreed.

"I vote we go around the aromatic and deadly swamp." Quel said, raising his hand high in the air. "Who's with me?"

"I second the motion!" Flau said cheerily.

"It makes no difference to me." Abir said.

"I agree that we should steer clear," Saida said, putting the back of her hand over her nose to block out the aroma. "This stench is too strong for my tastes."

"A word of warning," Abir said. "The city of Hawa lies beyond this swamp and the only way to reach it is to go through this swamp."

"Well what the hell do we do then?" Quel asked. "I can't teleport us."

"We do not need to resort to such drastics as that," Abir said. "I have a plan that I believe will suite our needs."

Hours later found the four of them in the middle of the swamp, Flau and Abir's faces covered by thick clothes he had produced. Saida and Quel were hoisted over their shoulders, comatose and delirious from the odor of the firethorns. The smell was so overpowering to their senses of smell that they were as good as useless. Because of the strength of their noses they also presented a large achilles heel with especially strong smells, like these fields of sea roses.

The journey was difficult. Not only did they have to lug the heavy weights of Quel and Saida, but they had to do it slogging through waist high swamp water. What made it truly difficult was if they had their masks fall off they'd be overcome by the aroma themselves. Abir had little difficulty carrying Quel, but Flau struggled to bear the weight of Saida.

Finally, after Flau fell into the water more than once, Abir took Saida off her hands and carried them both over his shoulders, like cordwood. The swamp itself glowed with a calming light, the sea roses making it bright as day. Even through their masks the odor was almost overwhelming, beautiful as it was.

They had no warning when a massed group of rogues jumped them in the middle of the fields. Springing out from beneath the water they wielded dirks devilishly, pressing them to Flau's tired throat before she even registered the movement. She froze as still as stone, eyes going wide in fear and shock. Abir was defenseless as the marauders closed in. They caught him with even less effort than they did Flau, if that was possible. He eyed them dispassionately, a profound frown on his face.

The pirates of Hawa, for that was who these men were, cheered lustily to each other, their prey caught.

* * *

Quel awoke to see an ugly dark skinned man with a ghastly scar running across where his left eye used to be, yellowed sparse teeth, a permanent five o'clock shadow and a bald head leering at him. He left his eye uncovered, a gaping hole glaring out at the world.

"This'n's wakin' up!" he shouted over his shoulder, his lack of teeth giving him a lisp. The man had a thick accent that was foreign to Quel's ears, though it could just be the lisp. Quel could hear footsteps as more people came over to look at him. Curious voices murmuring in a foreign language he did not comprehend.

His head started to clear, fogginess giving way to stark clarity. As usual he was in deep trouble. He forced his brain to process what was happening around him. He felt his hands and legs restrained and the pull of gravity on his body, the thickness of blood congealing in his head and back. The smell of brine, dying kelp and old mildewed wood reached Quel's nostrils.

He was like a hog on a spit, his arms and legs tied to a long pole that he hung from upside down. Thankfully he wasn't roasting over a fire pit. His arms and legs were so secure that no normal man would be able to even budge his arms and legs. His hands and feet were growing numb from lack of blood.

Multiple sets of feet came within his periphery of vision and Quel felt rough hands lifting up the spit and standing him shakily on his feet. He couldn't really stand on his own, they were holding him up.

"Go get the captain," said a gruff voice. Quel looked up into the eyes of another dark skinned man with a shaven head, gnarly scowl, nose ring, lack of any shirt and a worn brass gauntlet on his right arm. "Who are you?" he asked, a growl low in his throat. Quel got the feeling he was always one hair away from barking.

Reflectively moving his mouth around and tasting a sourness, Quel thought of what to say. "We got lost." he said.

The man smacked him violently across the face. "Lying to me is not smart," he growled. "Who are you?"

Quel calmly looked him in the eye, a stare that made weaker willed men falter. "You wouldn't believe me."

The man smacked him even harder than before. Quel felt a few teeth loosen ever so slightly. "Next time I will hit you with my bracer, thief."

Quel rolled the bloody saliva he had in his mouth around before spitting it out on the floor, deciding something important. The gathered misfits smiled knowingly. Apparently they thought he'd refuse to talk and then get due punishment with their boss' merciless right hook. He suspected this twisted interrogator would beat him senseless just for the fun of it.

He was saved from finding out when a door slammed open out of his line of sight and all his tormentors flinched and turned with the apprehension one usually feels when an angry dragon approaches.

"Where is he?" bellowed an angry male voice. A tall older man with a full black beard walked into the room. He was portly without being fat, old without being weak. He saw Quel. "What is this!?" he said suddenly enraged. The men started to stammer an excuse that was something other than what the man saw before him, but he cut them off. "Enough! Untie him and clean him up, our captain says she wants to see him!" The assorted thugs stood stunned for a moment. "Move you dogs!" roared the man, spittle flying from his mouth. Every goon in the building jumped to and three of them began to madly cut Quel's bonds.

When he was free he fell to his knees as two more men came and tossed water over him, making him splutter. Then they toweled him off with filthy excuses for rags. He was sure he smelled worse after those disgusting pieces of cloth touched him, but what the pirates cared about was getting rid of any blood on his face and making it difficult for someone to tell he had been beaten up. He still had all of his bruises and bumps, no way to hide those.

Then, still bleary eyed, he was forced to his feet and made to walk out of the building, which was little more than a shack, and down the boardwalk thoroughfare. He passed many men and women, all of whom looked on him with levels of curiosity, suspicion or disinterest.

They took him through much of the city built atop the sea, the ocean underneath their feet as background noise. Finally after passing more thatched buildings than Quel ever cared to see again, they arrived at a grand building built on solid land, on a rise above most of the city. They marched him through solid double doors into a room dimly lit by torches. The majority of the building was one giant darkly lit hall. Quel could see two small doorways leading into small rooms in the back, but that was the least of his concerns.

Arrayed around a table facing him sat five different pirates and from the look of them they were pirate lords. The most striking of them stood up as Quel was shoved forward. She was dressed in a flowing dark two piece purple dress that was so dark it was almost black. It exposed her chiseled stomach in the dim light, a stomach that was more developed than most men could hope to dream of attaining. She had her black hair pinned back with a golden cloth band that circled her head, it had an intricate pattern sewed into it. Her long flowing black hair fell down her back, wild and loose. She had gray hair at her temple, the only sign she was older than thirty and even that could be misleading. She stuck her well muscled leg out of the slit that ran all the way up the side of her dress and put one hand on her hip as she gave Quel a sultry smile.

I in no way mean to describe her as a butch woman, she was gorgeous. Her musculature only enhanced her already incredible beauty. As women go, this was one in a million.

"What would northern barbarians be doing in our fields?" she asked, the same exotic accent in her voice that every other person Quel had heard speak in this town had as well. "Speak the truth boy."

All of the lords watched Quel with little kindness in their eyes. He had been planning on what he was going to say the entire walk to this hall and knew lying outright would be stupid, as would be telling the whole truth.

"We are on a mission from my employer to find a man who has stolen something important from him," Quel said stoically.

"Is that your final story?" the female pirate lord asked gently, a grin plain in her eyes.

"He's lying!" another pirate lord said angrily. He was a proud looking man with a smartly cultivated black pointed beard. He wore fine clothes of light silk and carried two swords strapped to his hips. One of them was Quel's zanpakuto!

"I don't see a need to explain myself to you lot," Quel said, some anger creeping into his voice. "You're in my way. Don't be."

The pirate lords laughed, then the male one who had spoken out glared at Quel. "What makes you think you have any choice in the matter?" He smiled evilly and raised his hand, beckoning to someone behind him. A second later Flau stepped out of one of the two small back rooms. She had two men strong arming her with knives pressed against her throat.

"Her story is quite different from yours," the pirate lord said haughtily. "Care to lie to us again, mmm?" The knives pricked Flau's neck. She didn't flinch, traveling with Quel had been like a kind of extreme training in its own way.

"What about the other one's testimonial?" Quel asked offhandedly, wondering what Saida had said.

"The genasi didn't talk to us," the gorgeous pirate lord said, her smile returning to her face. "He seemed to think we'd get all the information we wanted from you."

Quel was momentarily confused, then excitement filled him. _They didn't know about Saida? They didn't know about Saida! How is that possible?_ He kept his face composed as he replied. "What do you think we're doing?" he asked cautiously. "And what danger do we even pose to you?"

"You don't pose a danger to us," the female captain said, raising her hand to quiet the other pirate lord. "Nor do we care why you are here. You are simply an opportunity."

Quel perked up at this and she noticed his reaction, nodding her head once before continuing.

"We want you to take a message to the Grand Caliph in Huzuz."

Quel was rocked at that. "What makes you think we would want to be involved in something that serious?" he asked incredulously. "Only a fool goes towards glory."

She laughed at this, and most of the pirate lords chuckled. The only one to remain silent was a hill giant that looked to be some kind of priest. "You are entirely in our power," she said, all pretenses of kindness dropping out of her voice. "You won't walk out of this room if you disagree with us."

The dimness of the room suddenly grew almost alive to Quel. At that moment there could be assassin's hiding all around him in the shadows, but even with his enhanced eyes he couldn't see anyone.

"Why us?" Quel asked. "Because we're expendable?"

"Yes," the pirate queen said simply.

_They're hiding something._ "I'll want a few things in return first," Quel said.

The pirate lords laughed uproariously at this, but the pirate queen gave him an appraising smile instead.

"You are daft boy," said the man with Kaze no Koe strapped to his waist. "I will not give you one drachma's worth of cow dung you incessant ass!"

"Akura!" the pirate queen said. "Let him speak."

"I want my crew and my sword back," Quel stated simply. "I will not comply without them both returned to me."

"Is that all?" Akura asked arrogantly.

"Some new clothes and supplies would be nice if we're going to be your messengers," Quel added after thinking for a few seconds. "If you're asking, I'm telling."

"I should feed you to the sharks for your arrogance," Akura said darkly. "If it wasn't-"

"Thankfully, though," the pirate queen cut in. "You know better than to cross me and the others because we choose this boy to deliver our message."

Akura glared darkly at her and the others. "Mark my words Jayani: I will be Pirate King."

"Look, just give me my sword back buddy," Quel said, gesturing at Akura to hand over his sword. "It's not yours to begin with."

Akura laughed, Jayani rolled her eyes and the whole court seemed to rustle as everyone shifted in their seats. "If you want the blade, come take it boy," he said teasingly. "Not even this court will stand up for you over a simple sword."

Quel's eyes grew very angry at that moment. "That sword is anything but simple," he growled. "And I'm not asking." He thrust his hand forward and the various pirate lords grew tense.

Nothing happened and Akura started to laugh. Then Kaze no Koe vibrated at his hip before flying through the air to land perfectly in Quel's outstretched hand, where his fingers folded around its hilt like the extension of his arm it was.

Everyone in the room jumped to their feet, becoming taut like bowstrings ready to be let go, everyone, that is, except for Jayani, the Pirate Queen of Hawa. She was looking at Quel with what seemed the briefest look of approval, before it changed to affronted shock along with all the others.

"Drop that sword!" she shouted. "Now!"

Quel took a calculating look at all of the gathered lords before stabbing it into the wooden floorboard at his feet. "Don't try to steal it from me again," he said.

Everyone calmed down after that. Jayani gestured at the two goons holding knives at Flau's throat and after looking at Akura for confirmation they both took the knives away from her.

"Do we have an accord?" Jayani asked Quel pointedly. She leaned over the table and held her hand out for him to shake. Thirty feet of open ground separated them. Quel was standing by the door with two pirate goons standing on either side of him. When he took a hesitant step forward and nothing happened he began to walk more confidently forward until he got within arm's reach of Jayani. There he stopped and reached out, shaking her hand at arm's length.

"Alright," Jayani said. "We'll see to it that you get new clothes and supplies for your journey."

"Agreed," Quel said with a smile. "You can come out now Saida," he added without taking his eyes off of Jayani.

The pirate lords had varying reactions to his words: some laughed, some looked around expecting to see someone step from the shadows and some ignored Quel altogether. That all changed a moment later when Saida dropped from the ceiling, landing in a crouch right behind Quel.

Everyone besides Quel and Flau jumped, even the indomitable Pirate Queen jolted ever so slightly.

"Now that we have an agreement, Saida here won't be inclined to kill you all in order to save us," Quel said cheerfully. "We have an accord!"

All of the pirate lords looked at him with varying expressions: some looked shocked, some looked angry and some looked disbelieving, but Jayani's expression was the best: she looked slightly impressed. Quel could tell it took a lot to impress her.

Saida was standing right behind him and it took almost no effort for her to do what she did next. Subtly, and attracting almost no notice, Saida inclined her head forward and kissed the back of Quel's neck, her lips barely brushing his skin. The contact set off an electric jolt all up and down his spine. She had come in, kissed him and stepped back in one fluid motion. The pirate queen stepped forward then, breaking the moment before it had begun.

"I'm glad then," Jayani said quietly, so only Quel and Saida could hear. "That you chose to accept our proposal." A sardonic grin was pasted on her face and a twinkle was in her eyes. Quel couldn't tell whether she was serious or joking. Her exotic accent didn't help reveal the true meaning of her words either.

Quel turned to find Flau walking toward them after having been released by the two goons. Flau, Saida and Quel looked each other over. It had been a long adventure, or ordeal depending on how you thought of it, to reach Zakhara.

Later he would find out Saida had escaped before they had reached the city and their captors had thought it best not to mention that one of the women they had captured had somehow vanished with three of her captors. Apparently they thought she was serving as entertainment for their three fellows. Amused, they continued on without waiting for them to catch up. It didn't even cross their minds that she could have subdued all three and then followed the rest of them to the city.

They were shown around Hawa, the City of Chaos. It was known as the City of Stilts by the locals on account of half the city being built over the water. Many of Hawa's citizens were normal people, living and even thriving on legitimate businesses. It was the hardcore 1/3 of the populace who raided for profit. Pirates through and through were they, high spirited, brave to a fault, superstitious to a fault and often bitter towards most people.

Saida fit right in with the saltiest of the pirates, outdrinking them and out brawling them at every turn. She quickly became a town favorite. Flau won the hearts of the city's young men with her looks and charm, further enhancing their awe for her with her lockpicking and other thieving skills. Quel was not graced with a young female body to charm the surly locals, nor was he possessed of skills that would impress a city of hard nosed corsairs. His skill with a sword would not garner him any more friendship in Hawa. Abir was too alien for the superstitious people of Hawa to do anything more than tolerate and he wisely stayed indoors during their time in the city.

As time went by the three of them regained the weight they had lost and acquainted themselves with the local news and gossip. Things were not well within the Land of Fate.

Apparently a desert tribe of unknown strength was harassing the Grand Caliph's caravans to such a degree that trade was being affected in all corners of Zakhara. This tribe was known as the House of Tayif, or the Ghost-Warriors. Their leader, Sheikh Mouli al-Ajami, a foreign devil with unheard of blond hair and blue eyes like a demon's, was a living legend in his own right. They dressed all in white and wore veils. They struck like wild lightning before vanishing into the desert again, leaving carnage in their wake. Rumor had it that they were planning something BIG. This something was never the same thing twice in the telling. Some said it was a raid on the capital city of Huzuz, to finally put an end to the depredations of the Grand Caliph. Others said it was a raid on the city of Ajayib to kidnap Caliph Halima al-Wahsi, renowned for her exquisite beauty akin to that of the gods, and force her to marry al-Ajami. The rumors varied like a rainbow runs through the spectrum of visible colors.

The only other rumor of note was one that talked about an increasing amount of hostility with genie's in the court of the Grand Caliph. Apparently the janni of the Haunted Lands were raiding settlements close to them and growing increasingly hostile. Attempts by the Grand Caliph's emissaries to contact the Jann of the Haunted Lands were unsuccessful. Rumors were rife that war was coming. A war of genies. Not something anyone sane wanted to have happen, including the genies.

Rumors persisted that the Jann of the Haunted Lands was dead, or dying and that the janni formerly under his control were doing as they pleased, killing and pillaging all those around them. Whatever the truth of the rumors were, the Jann wasn't controlling his followers and his people were dissolving into chaos.

Things looked grim. Times were dangerous. It was a perfect time to go traveling!


	18. 17 The World Below

**Chapter Seventeen: The World Below**

**Toril, South of the Genies' Turban, December 21st, 1391 a.c.**

The little ship cut through the water majestically. It was a medium sized dhow, a ship of Zakharan design that carried merchandise to far off lands. It's weathered brown and barnacle encrusted hull crested through the water like a knife through butter. The deep blue seas reflected brilliantly under the blazing light of the sun this close to the equator. Quel, Saida, Flau and Abir were passengers on this ship and it was bound for Qudra, City of Power. They earned passage by helping wherever they could: cleaning the ship, cooking meals, helping to tie down sails and other duties. The rest of the time they spent enjoying life on the high seas.

A school of flying fish were spotted at one point on the horizon and dolphins teased the prow of the ship as it soared through the beautiful blue waters. Nimbus clouds sailed majestically through the heavens, large as mountains. Saida only got slightly seasick, but Flau was in mortal agony for a day before she recovered splendidly. Quel, his seasick days a forgone memory, languidly strolled across the deck as Flau clung to the side, heaving out her guts.

Before long they were all shipshape and climbing the rigging for sport, helping the sailors for passage and relaxing at ease below in the main hold. They played cards with the sailors and learned all sorts of new gambling games, and a few drinking ones too.

Today was their third day out from Hawa. The captain told them they had only about another day and a half to reach Qudra. They had just left behind the Island of Firethorns and had open ocean between them and their next check mark: al-Tir, the Bird, which was another smaller island between Hawa and Qudra. All in all the trip from Hawa would take two weeks and they were just at the beginning of that long journey.

They had received clothing that was very comfortable, compared to the rags they had been surviving the Underdark in until their arrival in the corsair city. Quel had on a white sirwal, which was the Zakharan equivalent to pants, only instead of a belt you used a drawstring to fasten them to your waist. On his upper body he wore a brown vest with no undershirt, exposing his pale chest and stomach to the sun. For his head he wore a cloth draped across his shoulders and over that a fez hat that secured his head cloth. Saida had refused to dress in veils like most of Zakhara's women do in honor of the Loregiver. Instead she dressed like a minor scandal, at least to the sensibilities of most of Zakhara's populace, which basically meant she was only upsetting an entire continent. She was dressed in dark maroon harem pants with a matching form fitting bra on top and a broad piece of fabric that was used as a hip belt and served no other purpose other than aesthetic. She had delicately ripped off all of the sequins, embroidery and beads that had decorated her bra and pants, making them more akin to normal clothing, but still enough to cause a riot to the Enlightened folk of Zakhara. She was smart enough to wear a dark cloak over all of this in public, only taking it off when she was sure only Quel and Flau would see her. Saida also wore a loose fitting veil as well, but also only in public. Flau was dressed the most like a female citizen of Zakhara, wearing a jilbaab, or long loose fitting cloak that covered her entire body. It was a black cloak and with it she wore a black veil, making only her eyes and the bridge of her nose visible. Flau followed another custom by adding a black substance under her eyes called kohl, an ancient cosmetic. All in all they blended in and were completely undetectable...marginally.

Currently they were playing a game of ifranjiah on the forward deck of the ship. Well to be more accurate Flau was playing against Saida and Quel was watching. Ifranjiah was a Zakharan board game as old as time itself. Ifranjiah was a two person game. The rules of the game were simple, though they could be complex at first. The goal of the game is to remove all of one's pieces from the board before your opponent. Each side of the board has twelve long triangles called points, they are numbered 1 to 24 and are considered to be connected all around the board in the shape of a U. Players begin with two pieces, or draughts, on their 24 point line, three draughts on their 8 point line, five draughts on their 13 point line and and another five draughts on their 6 point line.

The players move their pieces in opposing directions, from the 1 to 24 point lines. To start the game each player rolls one die. Whoever rolls the highest score goes first. Also, whatever the number rolled is the player must move their pieces that much. For example, if a player rolls 5 then 4 they must move one piece 9 spaces, or one piece 5 then another piece 4.

The objective of the game is to remove all of one's draughts from the board before your opponent can. Playing time is often short, so games are divided into matches with whoever scores the highest winning.

Currently Flau had been maneuvered into a tight spot with Saida pressing her draughts from three points, threatening to divide her forces into three disjointed units. Flau was inexperienced with this game, but then again, so was Saida. Ferocity was useful in board games too, if Saida was any kind of barometer for these things.

(This game is very complex and I am doing it little justice, most likely translating it inaccurately for my readers. For this, I apologize.)

Quel turned away from the game to study the evening sky. The sun was setting on the horizon, half claimed by the sea already and the stars and constellations were beginning to claim the horizon. The sounds of the water splashing against the side of the hull, mixed with Saida and Flau grumbling and cursing at each other over the game in a friendly fashion. Sailors laughed with each other farther down the ship towards the bow.

"Yes!" Flau said exuberantly, having done a particularly good move to stymie Saida. The cat-girl didn't look too pleased and the sight of her juvenile petulance made Quel snicker, which in turn made her give him a childish glare that made him laugh even more. He was just recovering his breath when a wave of noise swept across the ship as sailors panicked.

"By the Law!" cried a sailor. "Look to the moon!"

It was December 21st, the moon should not be visible because it was the Winter Equinox, the moon should be invisible in the night sky. But it was clear for all to see in the night sky. Somehow a sickly moon hung there, giving off a glow that felt wrong in an indescribable way. What was more alarming was the shadow of a giant hand that was grasping at the moon. It was unmistakable: a giant hand was opening and closing on the surface of the moon.

Quel could hear chairs sliding back and he turned to see Saida and Flau standing at the rail of the ship, their cloaks billowing behind them in the sea wind. He stood next to them, joining them in looking up at the moon.

"I have a feeling this is connected to our little thief." Quel said quietly, the alarmed sailors behind him more than hiding the sound of his voice.

Saida nodded without turning. "Another god or goddess is getting kidnapped before our eyes," she said somberly, the quiet in her voice belying the emotion she felt. "What do we do Quel?"

"We continue!" Flau said determinedly. "This just makes our mission that much more important."

Quel nodded, though he realized they couldn't see them so he spoke aloud too. "Our thief will be ready for us. I think if it wasn't for our odd entry into the Zakharan peninsula we would have encountered his traps by now."

The sky suddenly filled with a blinding light where the moon was, making everyone who looked at it shield their eyes and turn away. When the sky dimmed again the moon was still there, only now it was black with a sickly dark, dark purple glow as an odd lunar corona.

"How do you know?" Saida asked into the silence. "Aren't you being full of yourself Quel?"

"Maybe," he said honestly. "It's just a gut feeling I was getting and the reason why we took the Underdark route."

"You know," Flau said hesitantly. "I think you're just saying that as an excuse Quel."

"You led us into disaster and we barely made it out," Saida added, not unkindly.

Quel remained silent for a while, the sailors all around them talked in hushed nervous tones about what they had just seen. "What are you asking of me?" Quel finally asked.

"Nothing," Saida said. "I'm just going to go my own way if we get anywhere near a disaster like that last one."

"Me too," Flau said. "It's not that we don't trust you Quel..." she said sadly.

"But it's just that you don't trust me?" he said with a sarcastic laugh. "Fair enough. If such a thing does come about I will help you both go your own ways."

Saida and Flau glanced at each other. Quel was still standing behind them and they were all still standing at the rail, the ugly glow of the moon over them.

"Deal?" Quel asked.

"Fine," Saida said.

"Okay," Flau said. "If it comes to that."

* * *

Seven and a half days later they arrived at Qudra. Of the remainder of their voyage little can be said for little happened after the Winter Solstice. They disembarked from the ship eager to be on their way. They said farewell to the captain and bade him give their regards to the Pirate Council of Hawa. They would fulfill their bargain and deliver the corsairs missive to the Grand Caliph.

Then they were all on their own in a giant forbidding city. What struck them first was that no one, man or woman, wore veils. Flau and Saida felt conspicuous, so they took off their veils and cloaks and found that they blended in far better that way. They all still got stared at and whispered conversations followed them wherever they went. It was simply impossible for that to be avoided with Flau and Quel's pale skin and Saida's blatant furry cat ears in place of a normal human's ears and her petite cat's tail. Not to mention Abir: the elemental man with black skin and a glowing corona around his head. Yeah, real subtle. They wandered through the streets, looking for a guide who would take them south to Huzuz, or at least another city farther south. It was Abir who helped them the most, with his ability to speak the local language. He led them through winding alleys and twisting lanes, pale buildings of clay and stone surrounded them.

"Interesting place to find a guide," Flau mused quietly as they stood outside where Abir had led them: a hovel on the edge of the city. The second outermost wall of the city loomed behind the small shack of a home. They were at the back end of the city's bazaar in a quiet place where the only noise they heard was the far off murmur of the city. Quel loosened his zanpakuto in it's sheath ever so slightly as they moved into the shack and his right hand remained on the blade.

There was no door, only a ragged cloth hung in the entryway. Abir brushed past it without pausing and everyone followed him inside. They found a middle-aged man snoring contentedly on a pile of rags, or blankets depending on how you looked at them, in the back of the single room that was the entire house. A bucket was in the opposite corner from the man, flies swarming over it. Saida wrinkled her nose in disgust.

"Wake up," Abir said loudly.

The man stopped snoring, but did not leap to his feet. He opened his eyes, no sleepiness apparent in his gaze. "Who are you who comes barging into my home?" he demanded levelly.

"We are in need of a guide to cross the High Desert," Abir said grandly.

"My price is 3,000 drachmas a head, no negotiations," the man said from his prone position. His negotiation skills were quite good and they couldn't get him to lower his price one drachma. A single drachma was equal in price to fifty cents, or half a circle, which was the Celestial Circle's own coinage. Celestial Circle, circles. Original.

It wasn't a steep price, but it also wasn't cheap. They agreed semi-grudgingly to pay, almost tapping out the meager funds the people of Hawa had donated. They counted their lucky stars: pirates weren't known to donate anything except free useless advice and knuckle sandwiches...

They left Qudra faster than most thought possible. Five hours after finding Hashir, their guide, they had full loads of supplies and five camels all in a line heading out of the city's southern gate. They had gathered supplies in the city's bazaar, then packed it all onto their newly purchased camels on their way out of the city, bribing the guards to let them out without going through all of the necessary processing.

Time was short, their enemy was three steps ahead of them and the fate of multiple goddesses hung in the balance. They were riding camels. They were only five in an unforgiving land that considered them to be heathens. They had to get to the City of Delights, post haste.

Time passed in a blur. After leaving Qudra they had passed through cultivated land that was filled with grain and other foodstuffs for the city and export. They passed many outlying buildings that were either shacks, small homesteads or supply sheds. A river passed them on their left; it met the sea beside Qudra. They saw people occasionally, usually at a distance, but sometimes up close. Farmers mostly, but occasionally the mamluk slave-warriors passed in battalions to or from the city going at a faster pace than Hashir was setting for the small caravan of five.

Then they reached open desert on the fourth day, passing the brink of civilized land very suddenly. Noon came and went and the river fell away to their left, leaving them only with sand and sky.

* * *

Things were bearing fruit. All perimeter defenses hadn't been breached, the Grand Caliph was none the wiser as to what was really going on in his city and the next moon goddess Dusk was planning on imprisoning was manifesting. Nothing could be better, which was why Dusk was more committed to discovering anything amiss than he had been before.

As he stood brooding in front of the holographic display that showcased the entire Celestial Circle in a faint bluish light, motes of light denoting planets, tethers and midway stations. He didn't feel anything amiss, nor did he have any knowledge of something being wrong, but that just made him more suspicious. He had a sort of OCD for finding trouble and when there wasn't any he endeavored to find some, almost to the point of making it.

A door opened behind him. Dusk didn't bother to turn. This deep into his personal sanctum within the Grand Caliph's palace there were only three people who could walk into this room unharmed.

"Still trying to find something that doesn't exist?" Shiran Lor asked amused. Only a Renegade Mastermaker would assume a smug posture with the imposing figure of Dusk. "I will be pleasantly surprised if anything does happen to impede our plan."

"You overstep your bounds Lor," Dusk said quietly, his voice resonating throughout the room, deep down in the belly. This was usually the only warning Dusk ever gave before violence and it was one the remaining members of the team paid close attention to.

Shiran Lor, a man who would face down a literal dragon and come out the victor, backed down. "Yes Dusk, I apologize." He fidgeted slightly, barely betraying his nervousness at all. "What was it you wanted to speak with me about?" he asked.

"I want you to check the perimeter of the city one last time. Add two more layers of trip alarms to the eastern perimeter as well." Dusk said this without turning, his attention never having left the myriad kaleidoscope of the Circle.

"Is there anything else?" Shiran asked.

"Stop by the Grand Caliph's court and reassure them of our progress."

The dismissal was unspoken, but just as easily understood as if Dusk had made a shooing motion. Shiran left, closing the door quietly behind himself without making a noise.

Dusk remained rooted to the same spot, the glints of his mechanical eyes focused on the image of his dreams. His dreams, our nightmare.

* * *

Ten days out from Qudra and they had journeyed some 200 miles. They had arrived at a famous Zakharan oasis. It was known as the Desert Mosque and was once the home of a renowned wise man. One of the Al-Badia, a desert tribe called the House of Nasir, or the People of the Eagle, stands guard over the holy site. Mystics and kahins, arabian priests, tend to the Mosque.

The Desert Mosque is a gigantic dome of volcanic rock, black as onyx, buried deep in the desert sands. It is a holy site that gives off an aura of mysticism and divine grace. The shrine is positioned so that it faces Huzuz so that in prayer one faces towards the City of Delights and thus the austere personage of the Grand Caliph, Scourge of the Unbeliever, himself. Enlightened nomads from all over the Land of Fate travel here to pray and receive some small form of spiritual communion.

They rode through the desert towards the oasis where the Desert Mosque lay with the only thing visible at first being the black head of the volcanic dome followed by green treetops and then the entire oasis resolved into existence before them. It was late in the afternoon.

"We've finally made it," Flau said in relief.

"Let's rest up, we have more than halfway to go yet," Quel said as they closed with the oasis, reaching its outermost area where few people had set up tents.

"This way Unenlightened Barbarians," Hashir said emotionlessly. They paid his insults no mind, all Zakharans viewed foreigners in the same way and Hashir was reasonably tame in comparison. After all, he didn't spit at them, curse at them in an unknown language or throw rotten vegetables at them. He wouldn't have been paid by them if he did, but that's another matter.

They set up their tents towards the center of the oasis, close to the Desert Mosque, but far away from it compared to most Zakharan's standards. They were the only foreigners in the oasis.

A tenday into traveling ensured they were used to attending to camp and able to set it up very quickly. By the time the sun was setting on the horizon they were fully set up and cooking dinner. Quel briefly went to pray at the Mosque, which earned him some odd looks from other praying Zakharans. Flau and Saida gathered water for the soup and Abir guarded the camp while Hashir made the fire and set up their small soup cauldron. Like the many nights previous, this one was no different: they ate their tasteless dinner and went to sleep in their bedrolls.

Everything was normal, until night fell and Abir stole away into the darkness. Saida and Quel followed him, leaving Flau and Hashir back at the oasis. Bloodshed was forbidden at the holy site, so they reasoned Flau was reasonably safe. But soon they became dismayed for it was no simple task Abir was sneaking away to do. He headed out into the middle of the High Desert, traveling miles that night. He was none the wiser that Quel and Saida were tailing him.

They had spent little time together so far and were pleasantly surprised at each others tracking abilities. They almost decided to make a game out of it, but decided against doing so. It wouldn't do to be fooling around now. Both of them looked like shadows, literally, because Quel had enacted Kaze no Manto, giving them both cloaks of wind. They were out of sight and nose too, for Kaze no Manto erased all trace of odor as well.

Finally Abir stopped after traveling for five hours non stop into the desert. He stood staring at an empty sky. Quel and Saida, about a hundred yards away under their shared cloak of wind would have traded confused glances if they could see each other. Their shadows were blatantly obvious, so Quel hid them behind the tiny ridge of an infantile dune to blend in.

They waited tensely in the silence. Hours passed. Quel was beginning to doze off and Saida herself was having her eyes begin to droop. That was when a speck appeared in the sky. Saida's eyes snapped open and she elbowed Quel gently to make him wake up. He jolted awake to find a giant white horse that looked like it was made out of the wind itself descend from the heavens. Riding upon its back was a man that was yet not a man.

The Great Caliph of the Djinn was a wind genie unlike any other. He was resplendent in flowing silk garb. He wore a turquoise blue turban wrapped around his stately head, an aqua green vest and pearly white sirwal pants like Quel's. He wore reed woven sandals to finish off his grand appearance, which made him look grander because of their simplicity. His flesh was pale as bone, stark against the darkness of the night and making him easily seen from far off. His height was at least seven feet and his frame was lithe and covered in sleek muscles. He stepped down from his brilliant wind steed, who wore a saddle of the finest leather with ruby red dyed tassels all along its length and a golden bridle and bit. It was of some surprise that the conversation began in a language both Quel and Saida understood: Common.

"Abir al-Fitna," rumbled the Djinn lord. "You should not be free. "Why have you summoned me from my home? What impertinence is this!?"

"Be at peace O Noble and Great Caliph of the Djinn People!" Abir said hastily, raising his hands as if to calm the Djinn lord. "I have returned and not run off into the night like some craven dog." Abir rose in stature proudly. "Think not ill of me for returning, but I must see finished my ancient feud with the genie peoples. I am putting to rest all doubts as to my loyalty by returning to you now in your hour of need."

"What treachery is this?" spat the Djinn lord. "We have no need of you or your forsaken kind. Not now, not ever!" The Djinn lord said this last with a violent swipe of his left arm.

"The Genie people speak of war, yes?" Abir asked loudly, making the Djinn lord break off into silence and look at Abir venomously.

"If you have anything to do with this..." the Djinn lord growled angrily. "You will be lashed within an inch of your life, then dragged through hot coals repeatedly until you tell us all you know."

"I know nothing of why war is imminent!" Abir defended himself angrily. "I was merely trying to do something to erase this millennia old blood feud between myself and your kinsmen."

The Djinn lord's scowl didn't ease any at Abir's story. "You were better off sealed within that crystal forever than trying to mend what your kind have done." Apathy of such chilling nature filled the Djinn lord's voice that it made Quel, the empathetic one, shiver slightly.

"Why is that?" Abir asked in genuine surprise.

"Because the only way you will avert war is to return the moon to it's former glory. The planes are rife with stories of how the northern barbarians goddesses of the moon have been kidnapped. It hasn't even been a month since our own goddess of the moon, Selan, was kidnapped. The foolish mortals know nothing of this because they do not see what is plainly in front of their eyes. Because I lead my people and have contacts in the Plane of Air I have heard of these things. I have seen the truth." His voice filled with despair. "Our world is cursed."

"Not necessarily," Quel said loudly, stepping out of his invisibility spell with Saida next to him. They had crept up closer very slowly until they were standing where they were now, which was barely ten yards away from the heated conversation.

"Who are you?!" the Great Caliph of the Djinns said in surprise, leaping away and preparing for battle. "What devilry is this?"

"O Lord of the Winds, be at ease. These are some of the people who released me," Abir said placatingly.

"Why can they be invisible to my discerning eye?" the Great Caliph said, still distrusting. "Only a coward sneaks about in the night." He huffed.

Ignoring the snide comments coming from one of the supposedly most powerful genie lords of all Zakhara, Quel pressed on. Saida rolled her eyes next to him. "We are on a mission from the northern gods to save the kidnapped goddesses and return them to their homes," Quel said while not breaking eye contact with the Djinn lord.

"If this is so," the Great Caliph said slowly, deliberately. "Then why are you in Al-Qadim?"

"The Thief of the Moon is here in Zakhara," Quel said dramatically, without really trying to sound that way.

There was a pause, followed by a pregnant silence as no one said anything, then the Djinn lord finally spoke. "This is a tonic too hard to take. Your story hangs on the premise of seeming impossible coincidences!"

"It has been my experience that there are no such things as coincidences," Quel said with resolute calmness.

Another pause. "Why should I believe you?" the Djinn lord said, a delicate tone in his voice, one that they must not miscalculate.

Quel could see this was a test. Everything to this genie lord was a test, but this especially so. Abir was doing his best to not look at them and wait for whatever would be.

Quel smiled. "We have no Fate but the Fate which is given us."

A frown crept across the Great Caliph of the Djinn's face. "What is it you desire?" he asked.

"Free passage to Huzuz," Quel answered immediately.

"All passage is free," said the Great Caliph offended, doing his best to be offended over political backbiting that happened all across Zakhara daily. "Why do you wish to go to the City of Delights?" he asked suspiciously.

"It is but one step in our long journey and if you could get us there quickly the moons will be returned to the night sky that much sooner." And the Thief won't have a chance to get away so quickly Quel added in his head.

"I will do this for you," the Great Caliph said. "But on one condition."

Quel's expression fell slightly. "Yes Great Caliph? What is it you desire?" he almost grated out.

"I want you to take Abir al-Fitna with you on your journey. If he aids you sufficiently on your journey I will consider supporting him in his wish."

Abir looked happy enough to dance, but he forced himself to remain composed. Quel nodded his head. "We have a deal."

Flau was rudely awoken, Hashir was payed in advance, effectively ending their contract. He barely bid them farewell as he went off into the night yawning. Then, after they had donated the camels to the mosque by simply leaving them in the oasis, they all gathered up their things and left. The Great Caliph of the Djinn had left them one giant 10x10 foot flying carpet. It was an amazing piece of magical artifice. Unlike most fanciful stories, flying carpets were not sentient and did not have emotions. It bobbed there looking alive in its motions, but it was an empty thing without motivation. It carried them and their small mountain of supplies easily through the air. For two days and two nights they traveled by carpet, not bothering to stop except for bathroom breaks.

Saida and Flau began to worry over Quel's determination to reach Huzuz and as the land passed below them at a staggering speed they began to also feel detached from the world below. Separate from it, yet somehow a part of it.


	19. 18 Spitting Distance

**Chapter Eighteen: Spitting Distance**

**Toril, Huzuz, City of Delights, January 12th, 1392 a.c.**

The sun was just peeking over the eastern horizon, the sky still mostly enshrouded by night's embrace, when they landed outside of Huzuz. A beautiful oasis surrounded the outskirts of the city and it was here where the carpet deposited them and their luggage before retreating back to the west. As the sun hit the many spires of Huzuz a brilliant golden radiance shone out, like a second sun. Blinding as it was it was also impressive and designed to awe travelers. This was the city where all of Zakhara's religion began, where the First Grand Caliph received the vision of the Loregiver, which contained Fate's wisdom and the Law. This was "the heart of the heart" of the Enlightened Lands. To the people of Al-Qadim this was their mecca, their holiest of holy cities. The Grand Caliph had the backing of the entire Zakharan continent, in name at the very least, and to harm this city and its ruler was tantamount to harming the entire Zakharan civilization.

A light gust of wind kicked up from behind them, lifting up a small cloud of dust that swept past to hit the walls of the fair city. On the wind Quel's eye was drawn to a fluttering speck of white that when it got closer revolved into a tiny letter sealed with a wax sigil in the shape of a crimson pair of luscious lips.

Snatching the letter off of the wind he examined it closer, confirming what he had first seen: a plain letter with a rosy red pair of lips in wax. Bemused, he broke the wax seal gently to find a short paragraph penned in elegant script, almost playful in its scrawl. It was unsigned, but if you had ever met the one who wrote it you would not soon forget the flavor of their soul.

In red ink the letter said:

_Dear Quelly,_

_Time is very short. I have done the best I can for you with the fullest of my measure. I have received a surprising amount of help from the other boys and girls who share my side of the story. I have also received a lot of opposition for my efforts, which you no doubt have already experienced firsthand._

_You are very close to finding the Thief. Be not afraid of the elements and stay on the path we have chosen for you. All good things come to those who wait, but a little sacrifice doesn't hurt. I will give you my favorite manifestation when things are most dire so you will know to beware._

_P.S. Tell your lady love to pray to me to get what she has been desiring incessantly for the past five days. She knows what she wants, so all she needs is a shove in the right direction._

This last little bit was written on the very bottom of the page and Quel nearly missed it. Looking up he found everyone looking at him expectantly. Without speaking he handed over the letter to Saida. She looked at him briefly before reading it. When her eyes reached the bottom of the page and saw the little note meant for her her eyes went wide in surprise before reversing to become dangerous slits.

Ignoring her for now, Quel led the group into the city. Abir was at his side, all four of them still carried their own packs. The guards at the gate let them in with little comment. After that they were in a new world. Because they arrived so god forsakenly early in the morning they found the city mostly asleep, with industrious merchants just now walking to their shops and the sounds of people waking up in their homes. Very few were actually already about their own business.

Quel made a beeline for the Public Gardens, which was as it sounded: a vast open space of greenery that was technically the Grand Caliph's, but was kept open for Enlightened citizens to visit.

"So...," Quel said to the group, sitting down on a wooden bench in the middle of the empty park. "Any ideas on how we find the Thief?"

Flau and Saida were silent, unsure of what to say. Abir was bold as brass. "We must go to the Grand Caliph's palace and present ourselves to him. If this war forged is here as you believe it to be then the Grand Caliph can't help but know something."

"We can't get an audience alone with him," Saida said slightly exasperated. "The only trump card we have to gain access to the palace is to deliver our message from Hawa's council. After that we're going to be kicked out rather quickly." She waved her hand in the air dismissively. "Foreign devils and all that jazz."

"Ah but we do have something they cannot ignore, or at least something their Genie Ambassador cannot." Abir smiled wickedly, tapping his chest with one finger.

"You're going to get us access to the Caliph?" Saida smirked, a challenging tone entering her voice "By all means, lead the way Abir al-Fitna."

He scowled at her before regaining his customary smile and leading the way towards the Grand Caliph's palace. "If not him, then his Genie Ambassador will be the next best source of information, I assure you of this."

The Public Gardens were on the eastern side of the palace, so it didn't take long before they arrived at a heavily guarded eastern gateway built into the sheer outside wall of the palace. By now it was about 8 am, still early but not unseemingly so.

"We have come to give a message from the Council of Hawa to the Grand Caliph!" Abir proclaimed magnanimously while holding out the ratified leather case with the seal of Hawa on it. After looking them over and checking them for weapons the guards okayed them for entry to the palace. A servant boy waited for them in the courtyard beyond the gate. He led them wordlessly through many branching hallways and corridors all decorated in fine marble and inlaid with precious metals, mostly gold and silver. Up three staircases they went and down hallways large as barns, through checkpoints with guards bristling with weapons. Everything glinted in the sunlight that was let in through skylights and a million windows of varying sizes. Most were small enough for only a very small bird to fit through.

Finally, in a large hall with giant beams of sunlight falling on a white and black marble checkerboard floor they were told to wait. Wait they did, standing together in their road weary state. Ten guards of imposing stature and build, bristling with even more weapons than the guards before eyed them suspiciously. Behind the guards was a set of tall double doors made of a dark thick wood that had metal hinges reinforcing it. The door looked like it could withstand a small battering ram if it had to. Braziers set in the four corners of the room gave off a calming and warming firelight. There were no paintings on the walls, but a lower bordering of fine twisting lines added flair to the room, if barely.

Twenty minutes passed, then forty and then sixty before they saw another soul. The man who finally broke their odd quarantine was small of stature, but tall of presence. The mere sight of him was enough to make the guards snap to attention. He beckoned the companions forward imperiously with one long crooked finger.

"What business brings you here to the palace of My lord?" the man asked in clipped tones, as if he could barely be bothered to give them the time it took to glower.

Abir took control flawlessly. "We have with us a message straight from the Council of Hawa." His voice was full of politeness. "And I am here to see the ambassador of the genie races."

The man gave Abir an appraising look, like one who has just noticed a rabid dog has entered his home unannounced. He took in Abir's extraordinary glowing light and dark figure as it fought the eternal war, one minute making him shine like a piece of the sun given flesh, the next making him radiate darkness like a black cloud condensed. Only his eyes remained the same, staring at the man as the rest of him changed colors, including his pattern of intricate lines that seemed to be embossed into his skin.

"Yes... Well I'll see what I can do," the man said after a long moment of silence. He gave his best false smile and took the message from Hawa before disappearing back behind the giant siege door.

"We're going to be kicked out of here, aren't we?" Flau asked into the silence that remained after the doors had slowly swung shut.

"No..." Quel said strongly. Then he thought about it for a minute. "Maybe..." he added lamely.

"No need to worry just yet," Saida said in a reassuring manner as she walked away from the group. "We'll know for certain what they're going to do with us when that official gets back." She sat calmly on the bench that ran along one wall for visitors as they waited. "It's pointless to do anything but wait calmly," she said patting the seat next to her.

"I have a feeling things will be getting exciting soon." Quel whispered so only Saida could hear as he sat next to her. Abir remained standing in the middle of the room, arms crossed and staring down the door like it had said something bad about his mother. Flau sat on Quel's other side, sandwiching him between two lovely ladies.

Time passed and then more time passed. From the sounds of the city outside and the way the sunlight slanted into the room Quel could tell they had been sitting for almost two hours when another different man walked out of the double doors to see them.

"Follow me," the man said curtly, simply. They all got up and stretched before following him through the giant doors.

The palace on the other side looked even more grand and rich if that was possible. The filigree along the walls became more complicated, but now the ceilings had such intricate traceries designed into them that it boggled the eye. Only the exceedingly rich or people born to rule lived in such places as this and among the few that could call themselves that kind of person even fewer possessed such grand and tasteful decor as this.

They passed through fewer corridors and halls, but the twisting and turnings they took on their walk soon became hard to remember. They climbed five staircases before they arrived at a small door with a silver knocker on it in the shape of an elephant's head. The trunk folded back in on itself to make the knocker.

The man who had guided them knocked twice, then waited patiently. A second later the door swung open wordlessly.

"You may enter and speak with Ambassador Jiraad," their guide said after he gestured solemnly at the doorway. "The women must remain here." Before "the women" could get a word in edgewise their guide walked away silently without saying another word.

Quel shrugged and followed Abir into the room. Saida just shook her head in silence, not even bothering to give these insulting customs a response. Flau seemed confused and was beginning to talk to Saida when Quel lost sight of them as the door closed of its own accord.

He and Abir stood in a lavishly decorated room with purple silk wall hangings and a fine carpet of the most exquisite design. Three reclining chairs were set around a round small table carved from red marble, a rare thing indeed. Jiraad sat looking at them keenly.

The extravagance of the room and the power of wealth it forced its guests to think about vanished from Quel's mind as he looked upon the figure of Jiraad. Marids were the genies of water and the strongest of geniekind, for they personified the raw power and ferocity of the seas.

Jiraad was no exception to his race's fearsomeness. His skin was sky blue and his eyes were red as blood. He stood at twenty five feet tall, had dark grey hair wound into a tight ponytail and pointy almost elfin ears. He wore only an ash grey sirwal that would have been fifteen sizes too large for Quel and a deep burgundy vest with gold thread sewn into it in a dazzling design. Jiraad's hulking frame was built with beefy muscle and his chair was three sizes larger than theirs. He sat hunched forward, his hands clasped before his mouth. The edges of a slim stylish goatee could be seen peeking around his vast hands.

"Why do you wish to see me?" his voice rumbled, like the roar of a deep sea creature or the far off echo thunder made out to sea when the storm was colossal, but still out of sight. He was not one sane folk would think to cross.

"This man," Abir said gesturing at Quel. "Is on a sacred quest to find the one who has kidnapped the goddess of the moon."

A deep silence, pregnant with its meanings, swept over the room. Into this silence Quel stepped forward. He had faced things far more worse than a mere marid ambassador, even one as intimidating as Jiraad was.

"I have come far in my search and all signs have led me here, to the Land of Fate where this thief has hidden the goddess." Following Abir's lead he didn't mention it was actually at least three goddesses of the moon. It wouldn't do for them to contradict this man's beliefs.

After a small pause Jiraad spoke, his words rumbling out of his chest again. "Why should I believe you? What can you give me as proof that this is truth you speak to me and not an outlandish fabrication?"

"I have no proof but the proof of my conviction," Quel said solemnly, matching Jiraad for intensity if nothing else. "Test me if you must."

Giving Quel a measured glance, Jiraad reached into thin air and produced an orb of clear crystal, smooth as a pearl, but opaque. "Grasp this and speak to me again of what your quest is," he bade Quel.

Stepping forward and taking the orb from where it floated Quel could feel a thrum course from it and then through his body. "I, Quel Tiin, am searching for a warforged, a man of metal skin, who has stolen the goddess of the moon not more than half a month ago."

Jiraad's expression hadn't changed, nor had he shifted nervously in his seat. But he had changed somehow. His air of authority had evaporated a little bit. "Did you say a man of metal skin?" he asked slowly, so as not to mishear something important.

"Yes," Quel said quietly. "He's here in the palace, isn't he?"

Jiraad nodded once, standing up. "This is most disturbing. Follow me." he commanded before leading them back out the way they had come. The orb vanished into thin air in Quel's hand.

Flau and Saida regrouped with them and they all followed the ambassador through more checkpoints and twisting elaborately decorated corridors before coming to a room so lavish it screamed royalty. Jiraad brushed past the two guards outside and knocked once on the door before forcing his way in.

"Vizier!" he said loudly into the apartments. "I must speak with you!"

The Grand Vizier stepped forward. Her name was Alyana al-Azzazi. She was an older woman, but no less beautiful for the lines of time on her face. She was dressed in full robes of white and copper with an emerald green turban covering her head. Only her hands and face were not covered. Her size was small, but she radiated the aura of command. Over her shoulder a large open terrace looked out on the palace gardens.

"What news brings you into my rooms with such haste Ambassador?" Grand Vizier Alyana asked calmly, though with an undercurrent of annoyance plainly in her manner.

"The traveler from Eberron is not who he says he is," Ambassador Jiraad said, ignoring Alyana's mood entirely.

"And why is this something I need to be told?" Alyana asked.

"Because I overheard that he's going to be with Khalil alone this very morning!" Jiraad shouted. "We must act at once!"

All color drained from the Grand Vizier's face. "Yes, at once." Looking beyond Jiraad she got her guards attention. "Warn the Captain of the Guard. Sound the alarm immediately"

"Yes ma'am," the guard said before darting down the corridor at full speed.

"Who are these folk?" Alyana asked, finally bothering to notice our intrepid heroes.

"These are people on a quest to find the one who stole the moon goddess last month. Apparently our impostor is their thief."

Alyana looked the companions over more carefully after that. She frowned when her eyes locked on Abir and she looked surprised. Before she could speak however a loud sound echoed through the room: thunder.

* * *

A door slammed open and Dusk turned to see Kardeski looking at him breathing heavily. The tumult of combat echoed ever so faintly from behind him.

"The palace guards are attacking us!" Kardeski yelled.

"Yes, I can hear that." Dusk said annoyed. "Is there anything else you need to tell me?"

Kardeski blinked and then grew fearful: Dusk was in one of his foul moods. "N-no."

"Then begone." Dusk said while waving his hand dismissively.

Kardeski closed the door faster than he had opened it and still managed to do it softly so as not to disturb Dusk.

So they found us out? It would be interesting to find out how, but that's unimportant right now. Dusk walked over and gave the Grand Caliph, Khalil al-Assad al-Zahir a piercing look.

"You serve no purpose except as a hostage," Dusk said pointedly. "I need not waste my time in reminding you that only your continued docility ensures you survive and that your country doesn't fall into the chaos of civil war." Dusk bent down and looked Khalil in the eye where he was tied to a pole upside down with the blood slowly rushing to his head. He would faint soon. "You have no heirs Zakharan Monarch, thus you are of some value to me."

Dusk turned back towards his worktable and all of the devices that lay across it.

* * *

The Grand Caliph was not in his chambers or anywhere within the palace. Considering the only place that couldn't be thoroughly searched was the tower given to the Eberron ambassador's retinue it was a safe bet that the Grand Caliph was somewhere in there with the enemy. Quel stood on the roof of the palace, Saida next to him. They had proved themselves to the palace officials and now they were going to do more. They were going to storm the tower and rescue the Grand Caliph themselves.

Things seemed dire. A huge storm had come out of nowhere and was sweeping across the Golden Bay to Huzuz. Soon the city would be battered by gale force winds and twenty foot high waves. This storm wasn't natural. Quel found himself remembering the words in the letter he had received right before entering Huzuz. The elements were definitely out of control. Suddenly, a great explosion ripped out a large section of the upper floors of the tower where the ambassador was supposed to be. Large chunks of masonry and stone slabs fell to the ground. Quel made a gust of wind pick up and then launch he and Saida towards this hole as if they had been thrown from a catapult.

They shot through it to land in the swiftly crumbling remains of a hallway that wound around the outside of the tower. Passing through a blasted doorway directly opposite of the hole they encountered a large room that was completely empty save for a pole with an older gentleman tied to it upside down. Quel recognized him as the Grand Caliph from the descriptions the Grand Vizier had given him. Standing in between Quel and Saida and the unconscious Grand Caliph was a young man of no more than twenty five years of age. He was nondescript in appearance and dressed in dark midnight blue and earthy brown robes. He carried an ancient tome with leather backing that was reeking powerful energy waves.

"So you're the ones after Master Dusk?" he said with a smile. "I have to congratulate you both. You not only managed to get by all of his detection barriers, but you got into the palace and subverted the guards from him before he even knew you were here!" The man, barely over being a boy, clapped his hands mockingly. "Bravo! Bravo my fine fellows! You accomplished the impossible, now die." He said this last in such a cold casualness it would have been chilling if Saida and Quel hadn't already been expecting such malice.

Then the man leaped backwards and his tome lit up with a fierce red light. _"Tephraderm!"_ he shouted.

A red flash of light blinded them for a few seconds. Quel had to roll away to his left to dodge a clawed fist as it shattered the floor where he had been standing. Turning to look he saw a giant eight foot tall crab like humanoid creature had been summoned. It had what looked like spouts all over its body and it sprayed hot clouds of fiery gas from them, burning large swaths of the room in its rage.

Saida sent a double fisted shock wave into the thing's back and sent it flying into the wall behind Quel. He of course had to throw himself on the floor to avoid it's unexpected flight. Another flash filled the room, this one green, and Quel thought he heard the man shout _"Bull rancor!"_

_Uh-oh._ Looking over and up, and up some more, Quel saw it was indeed a bull rancor, the biggest subspecies of rancor, that had been summoned. The floor started to buckle underneath them from its weight alone. Then it roared with such violent rage that Quel and Saida were forced to cover their ears or go temporarily deaf. The roar echoed across the city, making everyone who already hadn't seen the explosion fixate on the palace.

Something slammed into Quel's chest and gripped him tight before it began to squeeze him painfully, slowly crushing his ribs. Regaining his senses he saw that the tephraderm was crushing him with its right arm, its spout like protrusions were swiveling around to focus on him. Thankfully his arms were still free of its grasp. Before it could burn him to a crisp he forced a large portion of his spiritual energy into Kaze no Koe and cut the tephraderm down the center, from neck to pelvis. It split in two and evaporated into nothingness like a bad dream. Unfortunately the bull rancor still remained quite real. It slammed both of its fists into the floor literally shattered it.

Quel, Saida and the bull rancor all tumbled down to hit the floor below and because the bull rancor had gotten some momentum the next floor shattered even easier than the first.

They were ten stories up. The bull rancor plummeted through all of them, crushing the palace guards and the Eberron ambassador's guards. Both forces had been locked in a violent struggle. The bull rancor died and vanished right after impacting with the ground and then the whole tower collapsed atop everything in a giant mess. What had been one of the highest towers in the palace given over to visiting dignitaries was now so much rubble.

Surveying all of this in mid air was the young man with the ancient tome. The Grand Caliph hovered magically next to him, still tied tightly to the pole. He nodded, satisfied before the dust cloud cleared enough for him to see that Quel and Saida were hovering in mid air as well, both still quite alive. They were only about fifty feet below him. Quel held Saida in his arms and they both glared daggers up at the man who floated above all the carnage he had created. He smirked at them before his book shined brilliantly.

The Grand Caliph fell from the sky like a rock. Quel tensed and let Saida use his chest like a springboard. She shot away, Quel tumbling end over end until he smacked into the outside wall of the palace. She shot through the air like a missile, slamming into and catching the Grand Caliph. She was in turn caught by a giant bird that the young man had summoned. He rode on its back while Saida and the Grand Caliph were agonizingly squeezed in its talons. Saida was bleeding where it had first punctured her flesh when it had caught her, its razor sharp talons digging furrows in her flesh.

Quel regained his senses in time to see the summoner leaving with Saida and the Grand Caliph. That wouldn't do, so he teleported up onto the bird's back right behind the man. He aimed to behead him, but missed as the man ducked and rolled off of the bird, having somehow sensed his presence before the killing blow could be dealt.

A flash of red appeared below and all around the giant bird. Flames licked up around the bird, making it scream. Underneath it's scream Quel could hear Saida cry out in pain. Without hesitating, Quel teleported where he couldn't see, but could feel Saida. He grabbed her and the Grand Caliph, going more on instinct than anything else as the heat of the flames nearly made him faint. He teleported again, landing back on the roof of the palace. Smoke clung to them and dissipated slowly from their forms.

Looking out Quel could see a giant bird made of flame filling the sky. It's wings sent out waves of heat that wilted all the plant life with their every beat, it's aura of power blinded most who looked at it and it's eyes were fixed on Quel, Saida and the Grand Caliph. The other bird they had been flying on faded away to nothingness above this pheonix.

It spat a giant ball of flame at Quel. He called upon the winds and sliced the air in front of him, creating a giant explosion of air that met the fireball midway over the palace gardens. The resulting explosion of flame and wind made the entire eastern half of the palace disappear in fire and smoke.

When the smoke cleared and the dust faded away the phoenix bird was gone along with its summoner. Unfortunately half of the city was now inexplicably on fire.

* * *

The day ended with half the city having been charred, but only about one in fifteen of the city's buildings had actually burned down to the ground. Most of the city was blackened by ash and for miles away the city smelled like wet ash, but for the most part Huzuz had survived. The storm had raged and buffeted the city, but after the unexpected firestorm it was a welcome thing. It quenched and drowned the fire into nothing more than a wet fizzle that soon became nothing.

The Grand Caliph had survived his ordeal, his personal guards had all been killed and he had been taken hostage fairly early in the morning. Why he had been taken hostage was a mystery, as was why all of the Eberron ambassador's delegation had somehow vanished. The remains of the tower were picked through, but only the palace guards and the hired mercenaries bodies had been found. The warforged who referred to himself as Dusk and all of his cohorts had escaped without leaving a trace.

The only thing Quel could remember clearly was the giant mirror, like a doorway sitting in that room he and Saida had found the Grand Caliph in.

So close and yet so far.

They were allowed to rest in luxurious rooms with servants catering to their every need. "It was the least they could do," the palace officials said.

They took the time to regroup. Abir agreed to come with them and Flau was a bit sheepish, as was Saida, when Quel and she told Abir and Flau about how they had avoided numerous layers of detection barriers with their detour into the Underdark. Saida and Flau were mollified by nearly being enslaved by brain fiends with that knowledge. Mostly anyway.

They had only one lead to finding this thief again: Eberron.

After interrogating the palace officials they discovered Dusk had come from Breland, one of the Five Nations of Khorvaire.

After spending the night they all left before the sun rose the next morning, Quel illegally calling down the _Nacht_ in the middle of the Golden Bay, out of sight of the town but not out of sight of their boatman in the small skiff they had chartered. His mouth hung open as the glossaire engines on the little ship glared brightly in the dark of night and kicked up the surf. They literally stepped from the skiff's deck onto the ship's landing ramp.

Then, like a shooting star, they were off into the wild wonders of the Celestial Circle.


	20. 19 Orpo

Chapter Nineteen: Orpo

Eberron, Sharn, City of Towers, January 22nd, 1392 a.c.

They walked arm in arm in the streets of Underlook, an inn district in the Middle City of Sharn. Saida and Quel didn't have to affect the blossoming closeness they felt towards one another. After months of travel together they had finally let what they both knew was there exist in the physical. Both were old enough to know to be cautious and gentle in this first stage of their relationship. Many things would decide whether or not they would be a successful couple. It had been a long tenday since they had left Toril and Zakhara behind. Much had happened, some of it good, most of it bad. They turned a corner and saw the inn where they were staying at down the street. It was called the Broken Beak and had a hanging sign over the door with a faded golden gryphon's head with a pronounced crack running down the middle of it's beak. It didn't look happy, but neither did the inn. Dilapidated as it was it was still comfortable.

Walking under the eaves and through the door of the inn they were immediately assaulted and surrounded by the boisterous sounds of people eating and being merry at the bar and around a few of the scattered tables in this section of the inn. Serving maids came to and fro, delivering drinks and meals, busing tables efficiently. Saida led Quel past this happy area and up the stairs to their rooms. When they got to their two rented rooms on the second floor Saida did the rapid code knock, which was one quick tap followed by two loud thumps. Flau opened the door, standing aside for Quel and Saida to enter and join the others. The imposing figure of Chuldo, King of Destruction snuggling and kissing his daughter on the cheeks caught their attention first. They had found Chuldo and his daughter Dong Dong on Hydaelyn on their way to Eberron.

The circumstances of how they had met were memorable.

"You know this is where I was born," Saida said happily, surveying the floating globe of Hydaelyn, it's blue seas and green landmasses dominating the cockpit's viewport. They had just emerged from the tether connecting Hydaelyn with Toril and were passing through the Hydaelyn system on their way to Eberron.

"So you're half Mi'quote then?" Quel asked intrigued.

"Yes," she replied softly. "Half and half."

"It looks like a beautiful planet," Flau said excitedly. She was happy to be seeing a new planet.

"We have to continue onwards without stopping," Quel reminded his two friends. "We're in too much of a hurry."

"I know," Flau said glumly.

Just then the ship's warning sensors picked up something, the red light flashing on the control console and a minor warning klaxon tooting somewhere in the middle of the ship.

"What in blazes," Quel said askance, reading the display console for the sensor.

"What? What is it?" Flau asked excitedly. "Are we being attacked by zombie ghost pirates?"

The sheer random absurdity of the question made Quel snap his head around to look at Flau. He wore a puzzled expression. "Zombie ghost pirates?" he asked.

"Yeah!" Flau said cheerily. "Like the ones Captain Qwark fought in his prime."

"Oh god," Quel said in exasperation, turning back to focus on the ship's controls. "Don't believe everything you hear about the 'glorious' Captain Qwark."

"His name starts with a Q so I thought you would have known about him!" Flau said, sarcastically, a bit deflated.

Saida gave Quel a scandalous smile. "Why is that?" she asked.

"Because both their names start with Q's," Flau said.

Saida laughed, clutching her gut with the force of her belly laugh. Quel slumped forwards, sighing. "It's not...zombie space pirates," he said, changing the subject. "It's the moon."

"Zombie ghost pirates," Flau mumbled dejectedly.

"What's wrong with it?" Saida interjected, her laughter ceasing almost immediately, before Flau could ask anymore about Captain Qwark.

"It appears to be falling out of it's orbit around Hydaelyn and is on a collision course with Eorzea. I haven't run the calculations of where exactly it will fall, but fall it will."

Saida slumped back in her seat in dismay. "This cannot be," she said in a small sad voice.

Quel's fingers flashed across his control pad. "I'm bringing up a visual of the moon right...now!" he said, hitting the final key. A screen popped into existence on the viewport, showing the glowing blood red form of Hydaelyn's smaller moon, Dalamud. Quel stiffened ever so slightly in his seat, from surprise or some other emotion.

"Let's go take a look at the moon," he said into the silence.

"What?" Saida asked, in disbelief. "Why?"

"Maybe this has something to do with our Moon Thief, and even if it doesn't it's still worth investigating."

Saida's eyes had grown very dark with her anger. "Yes," she hissed. "Let's go investigate."

On the southern coast of Vylbrand Isle on the world of Hydaelyn lay the city-state of Limsa Lominsa. This was a renowned pirate haven on Eorzea and one of the strongest city-states on the entire planet. In Hawker's Alley, a world famous bazaar where merchants flocked every year, a battle was taking place. It was one sided to the extreme sense of the term.

"Avast ye miserly swabs!" roared Chuldo, King of Destruction. Currently His Highness was thrashing a group of thieves who Chuldo had somehow slighted. He slaughtered them by the score, laying low many men with his every punch. The spikes on his gauntlets dripped with his enemies' blood. He slaughtered them with abandon, cutting through their ranks like a scythe through wheat. The other bazaar goers had all fled long since and the local police had formed a ring around the periphery of the battle but had not yet deigned to stop the fight.

Then, suddenly and surprisingly, it was over. All of the thieves lay dead, the last one having just toppled to the ground. Chuldo scooped up his daughter and ran through the ring of motionless coppers and across town, back to their ship. The police were too intimidated and wise enough not to stop his charge. Even though this was a pirate haven Chuldo didn't trust the mercies of such a place. They ran back to their room at a local inn, collected their things and rode the elevator up to the airship landing pad where they had their own small ship berthed. Takeoff took only a few minutes and then they were away from the planet, one of many that had served only as temporary stops on their long odyssey.

Dong Dong sulked, though deep down she knew her father was doing his best to give her a good life. He and her mother had just made too many enemies in their time for peace to come easily.

Nowhere was home for long.

Looking down on the small moon known as Dalamud Quel, Saida, Flau and Abir—who had been sleeping in the galley the whole time—all felt a little trepidation. Sure it was perfectly safe on the moon's surface, but that didn't make them feel any safer walking under a blood red glow. Donning breathing masks and oxygen tanks, all four of the ones Quel possessed, they prepared to disembark the Nacht. Hitting a switch, Quel locked into place a pressurized door at the top of the ramp, then he lowered the boarding ramp itself. The rest of the ship would remain livable, but this small area would need to depressurize for them to be able to safely leave the ship on such an inhospitable rock.

A red glow poured into the boarding area as the ramp lowered and when they walked down onto the surface of the moon they beheld a rocky, sandy barrenness that was akin to Mars and Luna, the ancient planetary bodies of myth that had supposedly orbited 1st Earth. Quel led the way as all four companions hopped in the low gravity of the red moon. They walked past many small and large craters caused by asteroids hitting the moon over the eons. It was quite by accident that they came upon dark figures at the bottom of one particularly vast crater. They were about twenty yards from the Nacht and had been walk-hopping for about two minutes, enough time for the figures inside the crater to try and hide. Obviously, they hadn't tried hard enough.

"YOU!" Saida roared into the silence of space, leaping forwards prodigiously to arc through the air. The three figures at the bottom of the crater turned in surprise to meet her charge. She landed in a cloud of dust that rose far more slowly than usual, obscuring her legs but rising high enough to hide all of her eventually. She kicked out violently at her nearest foe, a man who seemed to be made half out of machine parts.

He blocked her kick almost effortlessly, skidding back in the soft gravel of the crater floor a few inches. The figure standing next to him, who was the summoner from Huzuz they had crossed paths with, leaped back and began chanting. Farther back a large imposing man made entirely out of black metal loomed menacingly, but made no move to fight as of yet.

He must be our Moon Thief, thought Quel before teleporting to land in front of him with a small whoosh and boom announcing his passage across the vast distance of the crater. The combat was very dangerous for everyone but the Moon Thief. Only he didn't have on a breathing apparatus, while everyone else did have on helmets and carried oxygen supplies on their backs. One wrong move for any of them could spell the end. Quel heard Saida's roars as he slashed at the Thief's head. The psiforged didn't even turn to look at him, instead letting the blow hit him square in the back of the head. Instead of cutting into him, or even sparking off of his metal cranium it acted as if it had struck a wall of glue and wouldn't move. Quel did what anyone in that situation would've done: he yanked, producing no result.

Psionics?! Quel groaned inwardly.

The Moon Thief chose then to address him. "You have traveled a long way in the service of your gods human," he said calmly, as if this was a completely normal experience for him. He turned, yanking Kaze no Koe out of Quel's hands and disengaged his sticky aura, letting it go flying off of his head to land point first in the ground a dozen feet away. "I find your luck in catching us unawares here amusing, but ultimately a hindrance." He drew forth a large, and very sharp looking broadsword, that flickered unnaturally in the red light of the moon. He didn't bother with any more useless chatter and simply came at Quel swinging. Quel ducked below the first swing and teleported to his sword, only to find the Thief had teleported alongside him. He ducked another sword blow that proved to be a feint. The Thief's metal foot hit him in the stomach, knocking the wind out of him and sending him flying backwards.

He couldn't tell how the rest of the fight was going, but he could hear beastly growls, not coming from Saida, and explosions of fire and lightning along with much shouting. At least he had his sword back. In the void of space there wasn't supposed to be any wind, but Quel didn't follow convention.

"Saikuronboru!" cried Quel, slicing the space in front of him and creating multiple balls of cutting wind that should surround the Thief and carry him away, cutting him all the while. Instead they hit the metal man and dissipated.

"You have prepared poorly for this," remarked the Thief.

"I'm not finished yet!" yelled Quel angrily. He teleported away, and rapidly cast a Kido spell: "Hadō #91. Senjū Kōten Taihō!" Ten pink energy motes shot out from around Quel and impacted on the Moon Thief, creating large blasts that lit up the sky and interrupted every other fight in the crater, knocking everyone flat. After the resulting giant cloud of dust cleared it revealed a crater much changed, and far deeper in the center. The Thief stood in the center of the blast radius, unaffected.

"A Kido spell?" he asked calmly, resuming their conversation like nothing had happened. "I seem to remember a foolish human who could use Kido and yet was in a living, breathing body not composed of spirit particles." Orange eyes glowing fiercely he looked up into Quel's eyes. Quel felt a deep sense of dread take root in him, something long forgotten stirred in the far reaches of his mind. Something to do with the way the Thief's eyes looked. They were very familiar.

"Quel Tiin, it hasn't been long enough."

"I don't know you?!" Quel yelled in shock.

"Don't you?" the Thief asked amused. "Ah well, I suppose it would take someone of quite larger intelligence than what you possess to see past this pathetic excuse for a body of mine." His voice grew more and more filled with anger, rising to a crescendo. "Think back to a time long long ago, when you were far more powerful than this. Back when the Kestävä still reigned supreme and the Circle was bright and new! Back when I had a living heart, and beautiful children!"

Quel was at a complete loss, and his posture showed it. Growling in disgust the Thief stretched out his hand and grasped the air in front of him, yanking Quel violently through the air until he slammed into the Thief's outstretched hand, whereupon he slowly began to be choked to death.

"But that is all in the past," the Thief said, malice entering his voice. "I will kill you for reminding me of it filthy orpo."

Struggling weakly to batter at the cold merciless hand that slowly squeezed the life out of him, Quel began to panic a bit. Swinging his blade with the last remainder of his strength he managed to hit the Thief a solid blow in his chest, which did absolutely nothing again. As darkness closed in Quel heard two voices, one whispered to him a promise, while the other seemed to echo faintly from behind him. This other voice was filled with despair and pain, raw to behold.

And that was the last thing he comprehended.

A bright explosion of light lit up the viewport on the port side of the ship, making Chuldo and Dong Dong jump in surprise.

"Flaming barrels o' rum!" Chuldo exclaimed. "What be that?!"

"An explosion Pa," Dong Dong said sufferingly.

Chuldo turned to fix her with a withering glare. "O' course it be an explosion lass, but WHAT kind o' explosion?"

His daughter got that wild gleam in her eyes that unnerved him and Chuldo knew they were about to do something dangerous, whether he wanted to or not.

"We will just have to inves'tigate!" cheered Dong Dong, pumping her little fist into the air.

Chuldo sighed, and slumped, as they altered course and began to descend towards the red moon at an entirely unsafe velocity...

Saida aimed another kick at the man half made out of metal and grimaced as her foot bounced off of his metal parts yet again. He was very adroit at maneuvering so any blow would fall on his metal bits and not the soft and easily damaged fleshy bits. He was a stocky man before adding metal to his frame, but now with his left shoulder and arm, right leg and the whole of his stomach turned to metal along with the left half of his head...he presented a grisly visage. Metallic red eye gleaming, he thrust at her with his metal arm that was three sizes too big to match his other human one and hit the ground instead of her petite form. A ripple of fissures and cracks swept out from the impact center, shattering the ground in a circle at least five feet wide. She was very glad for all of her training just then to avoid such killing blows.

The summoner had managed to conjure up three beasts: one beholder, one frost elemental and one cloud of thousands of whirling, spinning swords that seemed to possess a sentience of their own. Flau was running around in a panic, barely avoiding the many one-hit killing eye beams from the beholder and suffering gashes and cuts all over her body from the cloud of blades, none of them actually destroying the integrity of her breathing apparatus or oxygen tank. Luckily for her the blade cloud and the beholder were quarreling with one another as much as they were attacking her. The ice elemental was busy engaging Abir along with it's master. The genasi was holding his own, and more. He was blinking out of existence at random moments and firing off blasts of radiant flame as well as creating a giant wave of sand that swept over the ice elemental, until it froze the sand solid and glided out of it like an insubstantial ghost.

Turning back to her fight and changing tactics Saida employed her monkish training of her ki and fired off a barrage of shock waves that sent her cyborg foe flying, regardless of how his metal parts shielded him from the damage. He rolled up the crater before stopping a good twenty yards up the side of it.

Nodding in satisfaction, Saida heard an impact behind her. "I will kill you for reminding me of it filthy orpo." Turning, she saw Quel being choked slowly to death.

All at once she lost her composure. "Noooo!" she screamed, joining her hands together and firing off a concentrated shock wave that hit the fiend killing Quel and did nothing, simply dissipating. Without even thinking she charged, aiming a punch at the Thief's head. Her blow connected and bounced off, and she was sent flying backwards to land in a heap, limbs splayed out awkwardly and painfully. Her whole body screamed in agony and she knew he had somehow sent back the power of her shockwave and punch, maybe even more force than that too, to hurt her this much.

A deep groaning came to her ears, like the timbers in a house talking on a windy night. Blearily looking up she beheld a ship that should be sailing on some Earthling sea bearing down on them all. It streaked down like some avenging angel. A bubble of some sort surrounded the ship and shielded it from the inhospitality of the void. It crashed down in a cavalcade of sound and noise, sending up a huge plume of dust ( Knocking everyone off their feet yet again.) and obscuring the Nacht from view.

Saida pushed herself up onto her elbows, agony still wracking her entire body. The Thief had tossed Quel's broken form to the side like he was nothing more than trash and stood staring at the wooden ship dispassionately. Saida felt a hot wetness coursing down her face and was shocked to discover it was tears and not blood. She wept silently, unable to wipe her eyes because of her helmet and unwilling to move. The full scope of her pain, both emotional and physical still had her dazed.

Dark emotions boiled within him and corrupted his reason. As reason and coherency retreated, bloodlust and anger replaced them. This was the kind of anger that is toxic to whoever embodies it and whoever suffers it. Quel awoke screaming, but he was not himself...

Chuldo knew he looked ridiculous, but he didn't care so much about that at the moment (Only a little.). He was wearing an ancient diver's helmet and suit, which gave him a severely restricted view as well as an original and alternative fashion sense. He stomped down the gangplank of his ship, which was now on its side in the bottom of some gods forsaken crater, and pivoted around to face his foes. A wall of whirling blades rolled over him, scaring him more than hurting him. He punched out wildly, connecting on multiple blades and hurting himself more than his insubstantial foe. Then the swords had rolled past him and he saw his next opponent: a giant floating blob with one single big eye resting over a giant mouth and a head of hair composed of multiple tentacles with eyes at their tips. It had a scaly hide instead of skin and shot multiple beams from its tentacle tips at him before he could blink. One set him on fire, another sent a jolt of electricity coursing through him and another still turned a portion of his suit to stone.

"Time t' use her newest doodad," Chuldo mused to himself, aiming his right wrist at the floating monster. A mini rocket was attached to his wrist and when he aimed and cocked his wrist it pulled a trigger, sending the rocket flying to impact in the center eye of the beast. One explosion of flame, followed by a rain of gore later and there was one less foe to fight. Chuldo, currently resting on his back, was a bit stunned by the resulting shock wave of the tiny rocket. He got back onto his feet just in time to see a chilling dark blue energy trail spiral out then rush back into a prone figure, who looked to be no more than a young lad. A man of metal stood facing the energy conflux, his arms calmly at his side. Chuldo had no idea what was going on, but figured hitting somebody or something until he did know what was going on a good idea. He surveyed the battlefield until he saw a man made half out of metal...

Dusk felt a change in the air around him. Even though he no longer had skin, and the minute hairs that grew on it, to detect changes in the air he could still somehow sense things just as well as when he had a living body. Turning around he saw reiatsu pouring out of Quel before rushing back into him. When the pale fluid like substance began to condense and form a mask over his face he knew what was happening.

"So you have an Inner Hollow?" he mused aloud to himself.

Quel vanished and Dusk felt a violent blow hit his head and send him flying through the air too quickly to understand what had happened before he impacted with the side of the crater wall. Dragging himself to his feet, the sensation of pain telling him his psiforged body had suffered from that blow even through his psionic shield, Dusk used a mini psionic blast to dissipate the dust to see Quel, hollow mask fully formed over his face, eyes glowing a deep blue color with animalistic slits for irises. Steam poured out of his mouth with every exhalation and his hair seemed to have grown past his shoulders. His hands resembled claws and tufts of fur decorated his wrists and ankles. He seemed to be transforming more into a beast with every passing moment.

Dusk groaned in disgust, the groan coming out metallic in his throat. The blows he could survive for some time, but their ferocity was so overwhelming that he doubted he would be able to send back all of the kinetic energy he was receiving to harm Quel. If this scenario persisted for much longer he would either be overloaded by all of the energy coming into his body and explode or he would have to force it out into his surroundings. The resulting explosion would be large enough to wipe out at least one-third of the moon. He chose a third option: use up all of the incoming energy to use some of his strongest psionic techniques, ones he doubted most people would be able to fathom let alone counter. First he clapped his hands together and sent out two waves of psionic energy that manifested like giant shock waves, flowing over everything in their paths. The first was infused with sonic energy, which ignored defense and hit internally. The second wave was infused with sub zero temperatures of coldness, which with the void of space providing a balance made the entire craters temperature drop far below zero. It was a killing blow, one that would have wiped everyone out if the hulk of Chuldo and Dong Dong's ship, the Yahosun, hadn't been there to shield them all. Weak fleshies that they were, cowering for their very lives.

Quel took the full brunt of both shock waves without flinching, like Dusk knew he would. Before Quel could break out of the small layer of solid ice that had formed around him during the second shock wave, Dusk launched another psionic attack. Raising his galvanic steel blade over his head, Dusk filled it with the majority of psionic energy he possessed, making a giant blazing corona of purple energy into a mind blade, though far larger than any normal mind blade. This mind blade stretched twenty feet across the crater. Dusk swung mightily down, intending to cleave Quel in two.

The blade impacted and scored a deep nasty gash, but failed to pierce Quel's thick Hollowfied skin. It lodged solidly in his left shoulder before Quel's Hollowfication abilities started to heal the wound. A buzzing sound, preceding a brilliant mote of red energy announced more than anything that Quel was still alright. His Hollow Mask had the shape and form of a wolf skull. In front of the mask's mouth a red, brilliantly glowing energy ball was forming rapidly.

"A cero, eh? You intend to destroy me utterly then," Dusk said as he opened a dimensional door behind himself and stood ready to accept the attack. "It's what I expected."

A powerful beam of light shot out from Quel's mouth and erased the very space in front of it as it barreled towards Dusk. He simply turned insubstantial, letting it pass through him and through his doorway to vanish into parts unknown. As he returned to his physical form Dusk felt Quel appear next to him, but was too late in dodging. He felt a terrible blow and crunching noise on his left side and was sent flying and bouncing across the crater to smash into the side of it again. Standing quickly to his feet he met Quel's next attack with his galvanic blade and his hook sword. They traded blows, Quel with his bare fists and Dusk with his two blades. Neither could land a blow, or to be more correct Quel couldn't land a solid blow on Dusk and Dusk couldn't pierce Quel's hardened skin to do any lasting harm. The mask Quel wore was starting to grow horns at its back. Soon those horns would pierce his mask and he'd die from lack of oxygen, even if he wasn't entirely human. Dusk almost laughed at how easy this was going. Visored, Arrancar and their lot had such a dire reputation that only fools and madmen ever sought them out for a fight. Yet this was proving to be an easy venture.

It's probably because of the seal Dusk realized. Looking down he could see a subdued glow emanating from Quel's stomach and without really thinking about it he dropped his hook blade and pressed his palm against Quel's stomach. Quel, in his wild and brute-like state of mind hadn't expected a subtle move like that. Dusk infused explosive energy into his stomach and then "excited" it, pushing it to explode. The resulting flash of light blinded everyone before the delayed thunder of the explosion and the frighteningly powerful shock wave swept over them all, knocking them off of their feet again and nearly pushing them all into unconsciousness. The five senses returned slowly, almost like this was all just a bad dream. Dusk's two allies and Quel's three, along with the unaligned, but friendly, Chuldo and Dong Dong all got back up to their feet to survey the battlefield.

Dusk and Quel stood facing each other. Silence dominated the crater.

Saida rushed towards Quel as soon as the explosion ended, her earlier injury completely faded thanks to her heritage. He was always putting himself into dangerous situations and coming out the worse for it. He toppled as she neared him, landing face first in the bottom of the crater. Skidding to the ground at his side she warily eyed Dusk. He ignored her and vanished in the blink of an eye. Turning to look she saw him appear next to his two allies before all three vanished again a moment later. She had more important things to worry about.

"Quickly! We need to get him back to the ship!" she yelled into the silence of the crater. Flau and Abir arrived and helped her carry him back to the ship, only there was no ship. The Yahosun had landed on top of the Nacht, squishing it into so much wreckage.

Chuldo and Dong Dong offered them the use of their medical bay and Saida gladly accepted. When they were in breathable air again, she immediately tore off her mask and pressed her head against his chest to see if he was breathing. He looked normal now, paler than usual and giving off an aura of weakness. He had no claws, his long hair had receded and his mask had faded from existence, horns and all. He was breathing, but it was a very shallow sort of breath. Saida placed an oxygen mask over his face and then broke open the first aid kit and began to clean all of his wounds, light though they were. Chuldo began to pace the floor behind them, causing Saida to get distracted.

"Flau, take care of him," Saida said over her shoulder, the emergency of the situation adding curtness to her voice. After she finished cleaning his many cuts and abrasions she checked his pulse and gave him injections of adrenaline. The rest she knew was up to him. It was time for his will to live to come into play. Now, when medicine could no longer play a role in the survival of the individual, was when a lot of people died. The will to live was an important thing, one that changed the equation radically.

He awoke an hour and a half later, lightheaded and weak from overexertion. The first thing he noticed before he even registered his surroundings was the pain in his gut. The Seal had been damaged. He knew it instinctively, though he couldn't remember anything past being choked into unconsciousness. Failure was a bitter pill to swallow. Rising into a sitting position, Quel took stock of all his bandages. He didn't have that many, only seven or so, and his weakness was almost certainly due to his use of so much spiritual energy, it would eventually fade away too.

It then dawned on him that he was in a foreign ship and not the comfortably familiar confines of his ship. Saida was sitting next to him holding her knees to her chest. She was soundly sleeping with her chin resting on her knees. As quietly as he could he rose to his feet and crept past her into the main living area of the ship. He shut the door to his sickroom silently behind him.

Chuldo, Dong Dong, Flau and Abir were all seated around one small dejarik table. Chuldo was currently playing a losing game with Dong Dong, several of his monsters were eaten or otherwise dismembered by hers. Everyone looked up as he entered the room.

"What happened after I fell unconscious?" he asked.

"You sorta...went berserk," Flau said tentatively.

Quel felt a feeling of dread. "I didn't hurt anyone did I?"

"No, but you gave that robo guy a run for his money," Flau said.

"Well that's something, I guess," he mused. "Why are we aboard your ship? This is your ship, isn't it?" he asked Chuldo and Dong Dong.

"Well," Chuldo said hesitantly, rubbing the back of his head with one hand and not meeting Quel's eye. "Your ship is in cappable—"

"Incapable," broke in Dong Dong.

"In cappable of flight," Chuldo finished, casting his daughter a warning glare.

"What does that mean? Is my ship alright? Where is it?!"

"Underneath this ship," Flau said quietly.

"...We haven't taken off yet, have we?" asked Quel.

"Nope," Flau replied.

"...I see."

It was very silent in the lounge.

"Are you alright Quel?" Flau asked as gently as possible.

"Yeah," he replied softly. "I built that ship myself and took it all over the Circle and beyond. I'll just be missing her for awhile."

"Now what do we do?" Flau asked.

"We'll salvage what we can," Quel told Flau and Abir. He turned to Chuldo and Dong Dong. "Because you crash landed on my ship, basically marooning us, we're commandeering your ship."

"WHAT?!" Chuldo exclaimed. "I'll be having none of that laddy!"

Quel disappeared from his laying down position and appeared above Chuldo's head in the small compartment of the ship. He landed a solid kick to his head, knocking him over.

"It wasn't a negotiation," he said. "You owe us."

"I'll admit yer strong..." Chuldo said, while rubbing his head. "But I am beholden to no man."

Dong Dong sighed with disgust. "Chuldo we're goin' to help them fo' awhile."

"BUT LASS!" he cried.

"No buts," she stated.

Chuldo sagged in defeat. "Alright then. We'll help ya for awhile."

Quel stretched, popping all the kinks in his stiff body. "Alright, where's the bridge? I'll plot our heading."

Twenty minutes later and Quel had them floating away from the wreckage around the crater. He left behind a lot of memories with his ship, most of them good ones. Saida joined him on the bridge, they both quietly stared out at the void of space. Minutes passed as they remained in the embrace of quietness.

"Hey," he finally said, breaking the silence.

"Next time you bite off more than you chew, don't," Saida said quietly, a few seconds later.

A sudden realization dawned on him: she had been crying.

"I'm sorry Saida," he said lamely.

"Don't say that!" she snapped. "It's not like you mean it. You're just going to continue launching yourself into hopeless situations, no matter what the people who care for you think or feel!"

"Well I can't just hide!" he retorted.

"You think I don't know this? You think you know more than I do about hiding? About giving up?"

He slumped. "No, I didn't say that."

"Gods Quel!" she raged. "Use your head! Don't just react to the blows coming at you, counter attack!"

"Alright!" he said. "I understand your feelings. I won't put myself into danger unless I have to, alright?"

"Pff, sure thing," she said annoyed. She crossed her arms and stared into the void of space as they sped away from Dalamud. "What does orpo mean?" she asked softly a few minutes later.

He was caught by surprise with that question and didn't answer her for the longest time, but finally after they had nearly gone halfway to the tether connecting Hydaelyn to Eberron he answered her.

"Orpo means orphan in the Kestävä tongue."

She was silent for a few seconds. "Oh," she whispered ever so softly. A few moments later she silently left the cockpit, sensing Quel needed some time to himself. Time heals all wounds they say, but some just fade into the background to be remembered in quiet moments. In that moment, while piloting this ungainly wooden ship towards whatever lay in wait for him at Eberron, he felt all the memories of his long ago past sweep over him. Tears almost came, but Quel was not the type to cry often. When he cried it was usually only for something that overwhelmed him and his memories had been revisited and turned over so much all he felt now was slight numbness, a faint sadness and an iron resolve to finish the long forgotten tale. Only this time it would have a good ending.

But first he had to find a Thief of Moons and put the universe back into it's rightful balance. He hadn't been to Eberron in many years, but expected it to be filled with many dire perils. And Quel knew he had met the Thief somewhere a long time ago, on Vetus Prime. Back when the Circle was like a newborn and largely unexplored. He knew that when he remembered who the Thief was he'd have the key to defeating the him and regaining the gods and goddesses. He also knew the Thief knew he knew this and would do anything to stop him.


	21. 20 A Promise Across Time

**Chapter Twenty: A Promise Across Time**

**Eberron, Sharn, City of Towers, January 22nd, 1392 a.c.**

Night had fallen on the City of Towers. It was time to find out why the Thief had shown an authentic ambassador's license from Breland to the Zakharan caliph. To do this Quel had come up with a simple idea: raid the the City Council's offices, then using the information from that to find out who had issued the license to Dusk and track them down for interrogations. It was a desperate plan that went far beyond the boundaries of the law and could land them in the depths of the City Watch's dungeon if they got caught.

Sharn, the City of Towers, was as unique as a city can get. Arguably it is the most populated city on the continent of Khorvaire, if not the entire planet of Eberron. It rests on a plot of land that was tied strongly with the plane of Syrania, the Azure Sky. A plane of levitation magic and elemental affinity with the air. This plot of land is known as a manifest zone and this particular zone increases the potency of levitation and flight magics, thus allowing much of Sharn to float in the heavens, defying the laws of physics. Sharn can be divided into six areas, depending on the level each zone resides as a whole within the city. For instance, the highest area is Skyway, which floats upon magically sculpted clouds, then comes the Upper City which is the highest of the monolithic towers that make up Sharn's main city, followed by the Middle City, then the Lower City, then even farther down, is the Cogs, where the industrial sections of the city are crammed underground, in the bowels of the city. Finally, underneath all of this are the Lava Pools, which the great forgeries of the Cogs use to power their work. Some say there are levels even farther down, but this is unproven and pure speculation. Sharn was built on the ruins of not only the old Sharn that was mostly destroyed in the War of the Mark, but also the ancient human city of Shaarat and the even more ancient city of Ja'Shaarat, the hobgoblin empire of Dhakaani's greatest city that bore deep into the cliffs that Sharn now rises from. Yes, there is much of Sharn that goes unseen.

In the darkness of the night Quel led them from district to district until they arrived in the Central Plateau, and from there the Highest Towers civic district, all of this in the Upper City. This was a place that was at the top of the vast city, with many arching bridges and high daunting towers. Power leaked out of the stonework in this place like water did in the lower and less well-to-do sections of the city. This was the heart of the city's government and only the blind couldn't see that.

To the Sun Tower Quel took them. On a stolen skycoach they ascended to the top floors and smashed their way in through a tall stained glass window. They landed the skycoach in the center of the room and split up. Saida, Flau, Dong Dong and Chuldo were there for the raid, with Abir opting to stay behind and guard their rooms. After ransacking three rooms they finally found what they wanted at the bottom of one filing cabinet in one of the classified storage rooms. The Thief had been issued the license in much haste by the Brelish Parliament and oddly enough the man who had issued the license lived in Sharn part of the year and his family had vast holdings in the city. The man who had issued the license was named Hass ir'Tain.

The ir'Tain family was one of the most powerful and influential clans in the city. It was their wealth and influence that had built the first towers in Sharn and their fortune and power had endured even until the current age. It was 992 Year of the Kingdom, or YK. The whole of Khorvaire was in the midst of a century long war. Young Hass ir'Tain had issued the license in the fourth year of his service to the Brelish Crown, some seven years ago.

With much caution and hesitation, Quel guided his party to the Tain Mansion in the Brilliant section of the Skyway. They grabbed Abir along the way and filled him in on what they had found and were planning. It was not wise to cross such an influential family, but they desperately needed to know why the license had been issued. Of course disheveled miscreants like them wouldn't be let past the front gate, so they broke their way into the mansion of Sharn's most powerful family with much trepidation and a devil-may-care attitude combined. They met little resistance and managed to find and corral all of the servants, and family members in short order. Understandably angry, Dalian ir'Tain, the head of the family, and his wife Celyria ir'Tain, gave scathing glares to their captors. That was until Quel began to tell them why they were bound and tied in their kitchen at this ungodly hour of the morning.

"We aren't here for your money, or to use you as political hostages. We have no intention of hurting you now, or in the future. All we want is for your son Hass to tell us why he issued an ambassador's license to a psiforged barely after its construction. A psiforged that has gone rogue and is posing as a Brelish Ambassador to commit crimes on other worlds. We do not represent the lawful arm of any of these governments, this psiforged wronged us personally. Now, are any of you willing to talk?"

Over the course of his little speech they had sobered slightly and now it was the lord of the house, leader of the ir'Tain family himself, who spoke up.

"These accusations—" began Dalian ir'Tain.

"They're far from accusations Brelander," Saida interrupted with a perfect combination of amusement and scorn.

Dalian gave her a small glare, like her very existence bothered him, before continuing. "Yes, well our son is here in town. He's at a friend of the family's party at the moment and won't be back until later tonight. I'm sure if you will allow one of our servants to go fetch him he will be more than willing to answer any of your questions."

"No," Quel said simply, abruptly. "We wait together for your son until he returns. One night in bad company won't kill you."

The ir'Tains seemed to slump at that news and time crawled by very slowly. Quel had them quartered off, with all of their servants, in the dining room of the mansion. Chuldo and Abir guarded them, while Saida, Flau and Dong Dong watched for the son, or signs of trouble. Quel simply stared into space, trying to think of how he knew the Thief and willing himself to heal faster. Hours later, when the night was just beginning to truly blossom, Hass ir'Tain arrived home to discover a big unpleasant surprise. After he was tackled to the ground and tied up next to his parents, Quel put the same questions to him that he had his parents and Hass reacted very differently.

"I don't know what you're talking about," he lied.

"We broke into the City Council's archives you moron, we know everything," Quel said with annoyance. "Telling us what we want will make us go away."

"You wouldn't want me to tell you," Hass said in a low tone.

"We aren't your normal run of the mill thugs. I've got a score to settle with the psiforged and I won't tolerate you standing in my way. Talk." Quel punctuated his words by causing a gust of wind to blow through the house spontaneously.

The ir'Tain family looked ruffled a bit by Quel's display, especially since he hadn't spoken a word of power, let alone a spell.

Hass sighed, resigned. "I don't want any trouble, okay? He came to me with a lot of money and a letter of authentication from House Cannith. I just did what I was told to do. If you want someone to blame, look to House Cannith. He's their creation in the first place!"

* * *

Next they went to the Dragonmarked House Cannith, the House of Artifice. House Cannith had originally created the warforged and psiforged, which was what their Thief was, had supposedly come from the Mournland as well as Sharn in recent years. It would be far more difficult to break into House Cannith. For one thing the ir'Tain family's guards had been all human. In a Dragonmarked House the guardsmen could be virtually anything. House Cannith had invented the warforged, which was a living construct of metal wood and leather in the form of a man, and sometimes rarely of a woman. Warforged were designed for the Last War and fought in it tirelessly, until they were destroyed. Literal Fighting Machines. Knocking on the front door and asking to be let in would be useless, so Quel crashed their stolen skycoach through the roof of one of the House's upper towers. Almost immediately the alarm was raised within the House. To understand the severity of invading a Dragonmarked house it should be mentioned that a Dragonmarked House possessed it's own military might and had power and influence second only to the Five Nations of Khorvaire, the ruling bodies of the continent. Invading this stronghold was akin to invading an embassy to a country, a country that was also a corporation with its own unique technology.

Warforged carrying varying types of weaponry swarmed out of every seeming direction and charged them in the Cannith House, which was opulently furnished with luxurious furniture and cold fire sconces along the walls, bathing the rooms in blue flames. They fought when they had to, but mostly avoided any conflict, Quel leading the way, with Chuldo at his side and Flau and Dong Dong in the center with Saida bringing up the rear. They relied on the element of surprise coupled with their own mobility and speed to rapidly traverse the compound. Rounding one corner they, and their pursuers, spilled out into a courtyard where multiple warforged titans stood in daunting silence. A warforged was basically the size of a tall human. A warforged titan was the size of a frost giant and usually had weapons grafted into it, like axes for hands or some such thing.

What made the situation worse was that a warforged juggernaut, a more fearsome and bulkier version of a warforged, though no way near the size of a titan, seemed to be commanding this ambush.

"SEIZE THEM!" cried the juggernaut.

A wall of ironclad warriors charged them, rows of shiny, sharp metal weapons gleamed in the moonlight.

"STOP!" commanded a voice. Looking up on a balcony overlooking the courtyard they were currently in, Quel and Co. saw a man in his late thirties, early forties glaring down at them all. The warforged had all ground to a halt almost immediately and stood like statues while they waited for their master's next command. The effect was eerie.

"I'm not foolish enough to think you thieves, but are you really a band of saboteurs sent to destroy my valuable work? Speak now."

"We demand to know about a black psiforged that was allowed to become a Brelish Ambassador," Quel said, his voice echoing in the sudden stillness.

The man on the balcony looked troubled, his ire immediately forgotten. "So it has happened," he muttered, Quel and Saida both picking up his words easily enough with their adept hearing though he didn't know that. He looked up and spoke more loudly. "Why have you come foreigners? What is your purpose?"

"To stop the psiforged you made and put an end to his schemes. Nothing more, nothing less," Quel proclaimed.

The man regarded him for a while, then looked from one companion to the next and finally sighed wearily, yet also somehow angrily. "Very well. Javelin! Guide them to my receiving room."

"Yes My Lord!" cried the warforged juggernaut.

A few minutes later they found themselves in a small meeting room. There the man introduced himself as Merrix d'Cannith.

"So you are after a black psiforged," stated Merrix. "And this search has led you to me."

"Psiforged are supposed to be your area of expertise," Quel said. "Besides, we know you were the one who bankrolled the appointment of this psiforged to become an ambassador."

Merrix pondered them all for a moment. "He was more powerful than any psiforged I have ever seen, from then to now. He excelled beyond all of my expectations and had more potential than I could imagine."

"But something went wrong," Quel stated more than guessed.

"Yes," Merrix sighed. "He started to remember things he hadn't ever done. Places he'd never been before he was able to perfectly describe. At first he was elated and shared what he'd seen with others, but then he started to change. He became strange and reserved. He stopped conversing with the other members of his enclave. He came to me shortly thereafter and asked to become an ambassador so he could go to other worlds and discover himself as he served House Cannith's interests abroad. I believed him.

"A few months after he left I started to receive reports from our contacts on other worlds: he wasn't appearing where we sent him and he wasn't doing things in the interest of the House. I finally had to terminate his license, so he could never use his ambassador's badge on any connected planet.

"I take it he used his badge somewhere relatively obscure when you found him?"

Quel nodded in the affirmative.

"I'm afraid I can't tell you anything else about him. His name is Dusk, he left no possessions behind."

"You've helped us enough, I think," Quel said.

"Good, now get out of my house before I call the Watch and make you pay for that damned hole you put in my roof."

The trail had run cold, but Quel refused to give up on his search for the Thief, Dusk. That night they slept in the Broken Beak. The next morning everyone gathered together at the city's airship dock and waited for the courier ship to take them up to the space station where their ship was docked. Even though Eberron was a very advanced planet it was still protected by the Developing Planets Act.

While they waited, a young girl of no more than five years of age played with her mother next to them on the landing platform. Her young precocious attitude and impish smile made Quel grin back at her despite himself. She came trotting up to him at one point, her blond locks waving in the breeze and her green eyes dancing with delight.

"Mister didn't the moon look odd to you last night?" she asked out of the blue.

"Why no, I hadn't noticed it." He supposed that meant Dusk had come and stolen another moon goddess, or god, from Eberron then. While they hunted him he continued unabated. If only they knew which planets he was going to target.

"Do you think the elves know how to fix it mister?" she asked.

"I wouldn't know," he smiled.

"I bet they would cuz they're real smart and know all sorts of things,"

Her mother came up at that point and smiled at Quel. "Pay her no mind good sir, she's only a wee child." The mother guided her sullen looking daughter away by that point and Quel lost track of them. He had a brilliant idea spark to life in his mind anyway and it was at the fore of his thought processes.

"I know what we need to do next," he said to his companions.

"What's that?" Flau asked for them all.

"We need to go visit a friend of mine. She can help us pinpoint the Thief, this Dusk."

"Finally a bit of good news," Saida said happily. "What made you think of this friend?"

Quel turned to point at the little girl and her mother. "Why this lit—" he broke off as he noticed the very large landing platform was empty of the mother and daughter duo. He knew they couldn't have gotten off of the platform even at a full run since he last paid them any attention and they weren't hiding behind any of the other few travelers on the platform besides his companions, so they could only have vanished into thin air.

Looking at his confused posture, mouth hanging open, his pointed finger slowly drooping down, Saida walked up next to him and looked in the same direction.

"Wasn't there a mother and daughter here a couple seconds ago?" she asked, realizing what he must have been pointing at.

"Uh-huh," Quel answered. His mind raced, trying to think of a reasonable answer to what just happened.

"Meh, we've seen odder things recently," she declared before turning back to go stand with the others.

It was then he recalled the stories about a god on Eberron, the only one said to inhabit a physical form. The Traveler, the god of change who hid in a multitude of guises and forms, giving out gifts to adventurers and guiding them from the shadows in such ways they'd never be able to tell they'd been helped. But it was also said to beware the gifts of the Traveler. Contrasting and dangerous, the Traveler was not one to meet. Ever. Quel hoped his paranoia hadn't just made a monster out of that little girl, if little girl she had been.

* * *

Quel explained to his companions how he had an old friend who was a genius, with connections throughout the Circle and beyond. He hadn't seen her in years and felt it was time to call on a debt she owed him. From Eberron, he took the _Yahosun_ to a world in the Outer Ring of the Circle, and one mostly excluded from the political affairs that plagued the rest of the Circle. This was planet Chrono, a world protected under the Developing Planets Act and steeped in a myriad blahness that protected it from the interest of travelers and invaders alike.

Quel set the ship down in the one dinky, and run down, space station that floated above the world. From there they all took a courier ship down to the city of Truce, on the Zenan Continent. It was a lovely and verdant world in the late Summer. They decided to not waste any money on purchasing transportation and opt to walk the whole way to Quel's friend's house a few miles beyond the town. She lived in a nice villa, he said.

A few hours later, they crossed a large bridge onto an island off the coast of Truce. Green grass and rolling fields were all around them. Two more hours of walking later and they came upon the ruins of a large house. Quel was at a loss for words. His friend's house, which she had been in the process of converting into an orphanage the last time he had seen her, had been burned to the ground. He walked through the wreckage aimlessly for thirty minutes before he remembered something. Then he stopped, oriented himself in the middle of the charred wreck of a home and began to walk towards a large hill with a lone elder tree atop it.

Everyone else left him to his business. They stood back and watched as he trekked up the hill, dug with his bare hands at the base of the tree and found something. Then their curiosity broke their hesitation and they all climbed up the hill after him. He was holding a capsule in one hand and a crumpled note in the other. The note had been inside the capsule, sealed perfectly and untouched by the ravages of time.

_My dear Quel,_

_How long has it been since I saw your smiling face? Hopefully I will have seen it again before you read this, but if something has indeed happened to me, as I fear it might, then I want you to listen carefully to what I have to say. I have always felt a dread in my heart over the future that we destroyed to save our own, the lives we killed to preserve our timeline. I fear someone may travel back in time to try and kill my friends and I for what we did. You were there Quel, even if just for a little while. You know what we did to save our planet, the price we paid. This is why I hope you forgive me if I am not here to personally pay you back what you deserve for your help so long ago. But a promise is a promise. In my place I have left a scan of my brain, which if you place into a computer, or artificial intelligence—boy would I love to get my hands on one of those!—would give you the next best thing. I know this letter isn't like me, but I fear I have grown overly cautious in my adulthood. But don't let this letter fool you! I, the Great Lucca, still have a reputation to uphold! Whatever comes my way better watch out, because I am prepared for the worst. Don't worry for me Quel, I have lived an amazing life and if the worst befalls me I know whatever happens was meant to happen. Hopefully we are talking over tea at the moment and laughing about this._

_Until we meet again,_

_Your friend(no matter which timeline it is!),_

_Sincerely,_

_Lucca Ashtear_

_P.S. If I do not see you before you read this letter and the worst has happened to me, please find my "little sister" Kid. I worry about her, she's entirely too much of a tomboy. She needs to realize what a beautiful woman she is! Thank you Quel, for everything._

Lucca had been a good friend of his and her apparent death threw Quel into a deep shock. It was with surprise that he felt tears streaming down his face. He hadn't realized he had been crying. Two of them managed to hit a corner of the letter before he tucked it safely away. Reaching into the capsule he pulled out a data disk that no doubt contained Lucca's brain scan. He held it to his chest and stood there a little more. It was always such a painful shock to find out someone he cared about had died. There had been too many to count in his long years and he knew there would probably be many more. But Lucca... she had been special, a luminous being who cared deeply for orphaned children and pursued amazing paths of science for the betterment of the world. Her death was a sin. Anger began to bubble forth from the pit of despair he had been in.

Conflict gripped his soul at that point. He was faced with two impossible choices: give up the hunt for Dusk and look for Kid instead, or leave the planet and continue hunting the Thief while Kid suffered through who knew what. He struggled with this inner turmoil for quite some time, until Saida shook his shoulder gently. Looking up he was shocked to discover the sun was setting: he had been fighting with himself for most of the afternoon.

"It's time to return to the city Quel," she said gently. "We need to rest and plan on what to do next."

* * *

He had made his choice long ago and wouldn't turn aside now when they were so close. He would return to Chrono when this quest was over, or failing that, send someone in his stead. But he refused to fail. Kid could last another year he hoped. Couldn't she? Well she'd have to at any rate. It was in this frame of mind that he tried to find a new way to track down the Thief. Lucca's brain scan wouldn't be able to help them until they could activate it inside a computer. Until then they had to track Dusk down on their own. On board the _Yahosun_ Quel brought up a large three dimensional map of the Circle for them to ponder as they all discussed paths along which the Thief was traveling.

He was staying in the Mid Ring of the Circle, moving from planet to planet. But which planets possessed moon gods or goddesses? Quel was uncertain he knew of any besides the ones that had already been kidnapped. He also knew in his bones there were still other deities of the moon that were in danger and targets of Dusk, though he himself couldn't think of any.

It was Dong Dong who hypothesized he was going in a circle within the Circle, making a ring of some sort. Once they had that figured out, which wasn't hard for them all to see. From there they hit another roadblock: which planets bore moon deities on them? A search on the Circle's extranet, a Circle wide version of the internet that was highly staticky in places of strong interference, revealed nothing either.

It was then, amid their desultory discussions, that a horrible realization dawned on Quel.

"I know where we must go," he said into the silent galley.

"Where?" Saida asked a few moments later when Quel wasn't more forthcoming.

"To a dead and forgotten world," he said cryptically.

"Yes, but where exactly?" Saida said impatiently.

He was clearly debating what to tell them, or not tell them. But he finally sighed and made sure he had everyone's attention before continuing.

"We will have to go to what passes for my homeworld."

"Is that all?" Chuldo asked in confusion. "Why is that bad?"

Saida gave him a stare.

"What?" Chuldo asked in surprise. Then he remembered how Quel had described his homeworld. "Oh..."

Quel gave them a ghost of a smile. "Soon you all will have a better picture of my unspoken past. What you see will be hard to take in."

Without another word he got up and went to the bridge to prep the ship for takeoff. Ten minutes later Saida joined him in the copilot's seat. He reflected she was getting comfortable in it, always traveling with him from world to world. Maybe that wasn't such a bad thing. She didn't say anything for many minutes and just watched as he warmed the engines up, made sure the ship's bubble was airtight and the life support systems were operational.

Finally, though, she broke her silence. "Where are we going Quel?" she asked.

He turned and looked into her luminous orange eyes the color of a deep amber and told her the truth, without hesitation this time. "To planet Kotimaa, the world I was raised on."

"Do you really think we'll not be able to handle what we find there?" she half teased, half asked in trepidation.

He looked at her. "Only if you don't understand what it is you are seeing."

She didn't quite know how to respond to that.


	22. 21 The Three Words

**Chapter Twenty One: The Three Words**

**Vetus System, February 14th, 1392 a.c.**

The Vetus Star System was dead in almost every aspect. It had no sentient life, only unintelligent animals of various forms. It had no civilization, only the ruins of a once great, but now long forgotten race. It was even somehow darker in this system than it was in others, like the stars were being blocked by a dark cloud surrounding it. All of the companions on board the _Yahosun_ felt uncomfortable being here. This star system was largely avoided by the rest of the Circle. Not even criminals would take up residence here to conduct their nefarious acts in private because it was said to be cursed. With such a palpable aura of unease surrounding the Vetus System it was no small wonder many grim stories of ghosts and darker things surrounded the place. Oddly enough not one null beast , terrors born from the Sea of Chaos,chose to dwell there either, even though the lack of people made it an ideal location for them. to thrive and feed on each other Not even they would suffer to come here.

Quel guided the ship down to the main planet in the system, which explorers had dubbed Vetus Prime hundreds of years ago. The planet was a sickly dark green color, with black rain filled clouds covering its surface. The occasional flash of lightning lit up the planet at odd intervals. The atmosphere was murky and hard to see through, but Quel guided them with a surety born from repeated experience.

They set down in an ancient and crumbling city's central square. The atmosphere was breathable, so they didn't have to wear breathing apparatuses. The city had been overrun by a thick forest and lichen covered the majority of the surfaces, trees sprouted from the ruins of homes and grass grew high in the streets. Every member of flora looked decayed and withered. he oddest thing about the city, though, were the many statues of people that proliferated in the oddest places and with the most chilling of forms. Many seemed to be running with fright, others were carved to resemble people asleep; the multitude of expressions the statues conveyed, from terror, to shock, to surprise, made for a disturbing sight. Quel led them through this forgotten city, past halls and homes, through courtyards and avenues, until they arrived at what he sought: a decrepit old hut on the outskirts of town, making it nigh impossible to find because the surrounding forest had become twice as thick as the forest growing over the city. There was barely any room to walk through the sickly, leafless trees once you got out of the city.

Quel led them inside the hut, through a hole in its circular wall. It had only one room and in the center of this room was a large fire pit with plenty of space to sit around A hole in the ceiling allowed any smoke to escape easily. Quel methodically went about the tasks of making a fire, and once Saida perceived what he was about she helped. Dong Dong, Chuldo, Flau and Abir simply watched, waiting for what was next. When the fire had been built up from the pile of necessary dead branches, and it blazed a good foot and a half into the air above the kindling, Quel cleared his throat.

"I am about to attempt an, Unelma Sukellus, or Dream Dive," he said somberly. "I will be diving back into my memories to try and remember where I know Dusk from. No matter how I cry out and no matter what happens to me, do not intervene."

"Ok," Saida answered for all of them, her cat-like ears folded back in consternation atop her head.

Everyone sat in a semicircle around the fire. Flau got out rations for everyone to eat, Chuldo and Abir began to talk together quietly and Saida stared up at the rising embers as they flew off into the quickly darkening sky through the hole in the ceiling. They would all wait patiently for Quel until he finished, because that was all they could do.

Meanwhile, he submerged himself into a meditative state and forced every detail he could remember of the Thief to the forefront of his mind. He looked deeply into the orange flames...

* * *

"You can't be serious My Päällikkö," said Carthas. "He's just a boy from the human worlds! He has no place here among us!"

"Carthas, my friend, are you questioning my judgement?" replied Päällikkö, or Chief, Rohkeus of the Running Forest clan of the Kestävä tribe. The Running Forest tribe watched over the eastern regions of the Circle and had good relations with many of the other clans.

"No My Päällikkö," Carthas said more politely than before. "I merely believe what you are doing is wrong."

They were both standing in the Koti Teltta, or Home Tent of the clan. Both ignored the young boy of no more than ten years of age with his beat up pale skin, unruly dishwater blond hair and piercing sky blue eyes that seemed to see more than what he looked at. This was a young Quel Tiin, back many, many years into the past. Before he had fully come into his own, but not before sorrow had touched his heart.

Standing before him, arguing over his adoption into the Running Forest clan, were the clan's Chief Rohkeus and one of the clan's many War Chiefs, or Sota Päällikkö. There was no love lost between these two warriors of the clan.

"No matter what you may think is right, this is my decision," Rohkeus rebuked Carthas not unkindly.

Carthas bowed formally without responding to his Chief, a very impolite thing to do, and strode out of the tent briskly while glaring utter hatred at our young and sensitive Quel Tiin. Quel didn't know what to do with such hatred directed at him. He'd never done anything mean towards Carthas, so why was he being treated like shit? He began to silently cry, sniffling to himself over his poor state. Where were his parents? His family?

Rohkeus silently picked him up and held him to his chest while humming in his deep baritone voice, the reverberations coursing through his chest and into Quel's, calming the young boy down.

"You have been through much lad, but do not cry for yourself. Mourn your family and let them move on to the Halls of Your Ancestors so that they can know true peace."

"Okay." Quel sniffled. "I'll try to."

"We do not Try." Rohkeus said, not unkindly. "We Do. To try is to give up halfway through, but to do is to see things through until the end, no matter what."

"Yes P-päähllikkeö," said Quel.

Rohkeus laughed a deep hearty laugh, joy coursing through him and lifting Quel's spirits by proximity. "You will do well in life Little Taistelija."

_Little Fighter._

Rohkeus couldn't have given him a more apt nickname if he had tried to.

* * *

"That's not enough!" screamed Carthas in rage. He struck fast as an adder, knocking Quel's feet out from under him and sending his training stick flying through the air to hit the ground far away with a profound thunk.

"Your footwork is pathetic Oppilas Quel. Are you really aspiring to become a member in the Fellowship of Kest? Better to aim for something more in line with your skill set. Like... a talonmies?" Carthas remarked nastily, almost as if to himself. If it wasn't for the fact that he talked just loudly enough so that all of the gathered students, the one-hundred other oppilas, could perfectly hear him Quel would believe the act. A talonmies was basically a janitor, only with a slightly better pay wage. About half of the other gathered students snickered and laughed, while the rest looked nervous and confused over their teacher's display of cruelty.

Three years had passed since his acceptance into the Running Forest clan and Carthas had not slacked one inch in his revilement of Quel. The abuse had caught Quel by surprise, when on his first day in the academy of Kest Carthas had singled him out and subjected him to severe tests that only a third level meikka could hope to perform. Quel hadn't known that for his first two months of school how irregular Carthas was being towards him. Then his friends had all gathered up the courage to tell him (Apparently Carthas was a bit of an extreme punisher to any students who crossed him.) and from then on he knew he had to accept whatever Carthas dished out.

Eventually he began to excel at the tasks Carthas gave him, so Carthas switched up the difficulty level, giving him tests of endurance, fortitude and skill that only a first level ritari could easily do. Nowadays Quel failed more than he succeeded, but it was worth it for the moments of success when he got to see the look on Carthas' face; the expression of utter surprise and disbelief. That look in his eyes was well worth the trouble.

* * *

"You are responsible for this!" yelled Carthas. "It was because of your stupidity that five of my students died!"

"You're wrong Sota Päällikkö Carthas," replied Quel evenly, though a bit angrily. "It was because of your shortsightedness that you led five untrained oppilas into the territory of such a large synkkä eläin. You dishonor yourself by not accepting your responsibility."

Carthas unsheathed a dagger, lightning quick, and tried to stab Quel in the chest.

"Filthy orpo!"

The warriors on either side of him did their best to restrain Carthas and a scuffle broke out.

"ENOUGH!" roared Rohkeus. "You dare to try and kill a member of your own tribe, and in front of me no less?" Rohkeus was sick with his shock and dismay.

"My Päällikkö—" Carthas began shakily.

"Do not call me that Carthas," Rohkeus said in utter anger. "I have tried to understand your hate for this boy these past nine years. I even made excuses for you, that you were just being tough on him, anything but the apparent truth." Rohkeus rose from his throne of wood and vine and cast his gaze on every member of the tribe there in the Koti Teltta that day, which was all four hundred plus members of the clan. It should be mentioned that no ordinary tent of leather and canvas could hold over four hundred people, but the Kestävä have their own mag about them, granting them the ability to do many things of wonder beyond the ken of men. The Koti Teltta was just one of the smaller wonders.

"Let it be known that from this day onwards Carthas Poikana-Tulipalo is forevermore removed from the Halls of Honor. His name is to be given the moniker ilman kestävyyttä."

Ilman kestävyyttä was a title of no return, only given to those who dishonored the tribe to its furthest extent and thus became lost ones. Few were those who had become ilman kestävyyttä, which was why a hush fell over the entire assembled clan like the pall of death itself. Carthas stared wide eyed at nothing and knelt lifeless on his knees, his arms limp at his sides.

Quel did not want it to have come to this, and Rohkeus, seeing him begin to move, gave a little glare. Quel stilled himself and accepted what cards had already been dealt.

A conflagration of invisible spectrums of light shot out of Rohkeus' throne like the tendrils of some beast and twined about Carthas' unmoving form. He was lifted up into the air and a mark was burned into his forehead and back: the mark of the ilman kestävyyttä. He fell to the ground and stayed there, seemingly lifeless.

Carthas was dragged out of the Home Tent and he and his family were sent away, forever cast out of the clan and tribe.

* * *

Explosions colored the darkened mid morning sky and dazzled the eyes. But the corpses on the ground and the shambling horrors composed of fire and ice were what really grabbed Quel's attention. He, along with the other members of this surviving band of Kest warriors were protecting the Princess Selvittää and her younger brother Ollakova. They had managed to fight their way out of the Royal Palace and the massacre that had occurred therein, but were losing warriors every step of the way in the hordes of enemies that had arrayed against them in the Royal Capital itself. Taitava, the Squad Leader of their band, had managed to find them an airspeeder, or ilmakiituri in the Kestava tongue. The problem was they had to leave behind ten warriors for the rest to fit in the large and luxurious craft. It floated on the silent force that animates all life, making the inanimate animate: aether. It would follow their commands, though it could sense the coming Doom just as well as they could.

Quel was among those left behind. It was with the guiding of fate, or destiny, that he saw Carthas one last time on this terrible day. Ennustaja, another member of their band, had managed to hot wire three other airspeeders and the remaining ten warriors crammed into these smaller craft and followed the Princess and Prince. They caught up to them just as the larger luxury craft was shot out of the air by a band of fire and ice demons. Vioittunut, fallen ones killed in the day's events, appeared. The fallen ones who hadn't turned to stone, that is. These ones had been mutated into stronger and perverse versions of their former selves. Betrayers of their own, the vioittunut were cursed beings neither alive nor fully dead. Their hearts and minds were turned utterly away from light and instead oriented around darkness and carnage in a hive mind, a grave mind. Their forms were said to mimic the corrosive influence of their hearts on their physical bodies. One vioittunut, who had once been a man, now shambled on legs too small to support his bulging and grotesque arms, one of which was the size of his entire body with yellow claws instead of fingers. Another, who had once been a normal woman, had a mouth ten sizes too large for her head and a long tapering neck like a snakes. She spat a toxic acidic liquid that could burn a person to their very marrow. The sick smell of rot surrounded the vioittunut and announced their presence like a clarion call. Pus oozed from their twisted forms. They were highly contagious, to the dead that is. But if there were enough of them nothing could stand against them for long. There happened to be plenty there that day.

One of the three air speeders in pursuit crash landed in the midst of the vioittunut and was overwhelmed, all hands lost, or worse. Quel leaped from his ship before it could fully land and thus survived where none of his six fellow passengers did. The ship exploded behind him as it was overwhelmed by a colossal frost/fire demon at least sixteen feet tall. Taitava rallied his warriors around the crashed luxury ship, urgently calling them to fight for their monarchs. The Princess was kneeling over the broken form of her younger brother Ollakova. He wasn't moving. Her shoulders shook uncontrollably as she sobbed, alone yet surrounded in the middle of bloody chaos. Quel joined his comrades to fight off the hordes of monstrosities. Taitava led a group of twenty against the colossal frost/fire demon and Quel followed Järrvi, the second lieutenant, into battle against the vioittunut that threatened to overwhelm them from the rear.

There were hundreds of the crawling, running, shambling things. Quel changed his sacred sword into a tykki terä, or cannon blade. Aiming at a mass of charging vioittunut, he unleashed a beam of plasma that sheared through the ranks of charging things easily, immolating and eviscerating them in a fiery display. He changed his blade back into a normal glowing sword and beheaded another betrayer that looked more like a gorilla with its flesh peeling off of it in decay than the man it had once been. Looking up from his struggle he saw the Princess was in danger. Casting caution to the winds, Quel charged across the battlefield, nearly dying four times in the process from an errant weapon swing from his comrades and the grasping arms of the vioittunut. He leaped over an acid pool spat into being by an ugly-as-sin vioittunut and dodged tentacles, claws and other appendages beyond description as he tried to reach the Princess in time. Then, impossible as it was to believe, Carthas appeared next to the Princess and killed all of the vioittunut that were almost upon her kneeling form with his own sacred blade. Quel arrived a minute later, out of breath and covered in a dozen mini new wounds.

"Carthas?" he gasped in shock. "Why are you here?"

"Someone needed to protect Her Highness properly boy," Carthas said calmly. If Quel had been in the right frame of mind he would have sensed something was wrong here, but he didn't.

"Where's your family?" Quel asked, his breathing more under control now and his eyes constantly casting about for more trouble.

"Safe, boy, safer than we are."

The tide of the battle grew in their enemy's favor, forcing Quel to leave and bolster the defenses on the right line. Five minutes later Taitava brought down the frost/fire demon by forming a spear with his sacred blade and stabbing the thing through its ugly head. Exhausted and still standing, they all gathered around the Princess.

"We're probably the last of our clan Quel," Carthas remarked as Taitava issued new orders.

Quel, remembering Carthas' banishment and expulsion from the annals of their ancestors suddenly grew extremely cautious and cursed himself for a fool.

"Carthas," he said, the tone of his voice making several Fellows of Kest look up because they knew him well. "What brought you here today?"

"Duty my young oppilas. What else?" Carthas replied casually, too casually. Now that Quel could see it, the look in Carthas' eyes was dreamy. His gut told him the truth of the situation: Carthas had fallen just like the vioittunut had, only in a more insidious and hidden way. They had only seconds to get him away from the Princess before disaster struck.

"Enemy here!" Quel screamed, drawing his sacred blade and trying to form it into five separate floating daggers all at once.

At his scream, all the Fellows of Kest near Carthas rushed him, trying to tackle him to the ground and bear him away. They had moved as one, of one mind, without giving away their suspicions. All of this had transpired in mere moments, hardly enough time to grasp the situation from an outside perspective. But it was still in vain. Carthas danced away jerkily, like a puppet on invisible strings. He laughed madly.

"Well done Fellows of Kest." Carthas said in a voice that wasn't his. A voice devoid of all emotion but cold mirth. "I am surprised you sensed me before I could complete my goal to its fullest. you do honor to your ancestors, now go tell them I said so."

A great explosion erupted from Carthas, flattening all of the survivors and annihilating those too close to him. The light was blinding, burning. And suddenly another turn for the worse occurred: the Hämähäkit activated a trap of theirs, turning off the gravity and sucking anyone who wasn't quick enough to grab something up into the infinity of the skies.

Quel, bleary from the explosion, half deaf and two-thirds of the way blind, still managed to leap for the Princess, grab her around her waist. With his other arm he desperately reached out and grabbed a streetlamp. They hung on by the skin of his fingers, slowly sliding up the length of the light until his fingers snagged on the top of the pole where the lamp itself made a perfect grip. Up, up, up the unlucky went until they were beyond the range of sight. The whole city experienced the same phenomenon, with debris, vioittunut and even houses and vehicles rising high into the atmosphere.

Then it ended and everything crashed down. The suddenness of it all: the returning gravity and the vertigo of falling to the ground again, the deafening cacophony of everything and everyone returning to the ground; the splintering noises of wood and bone, the meaty smack of bodies hitting nearby by the dozens; all of it was too much for Quel to bear and he fell into the darkness of the unconscious mind.

* * *

Quel jolted awake with a gasp. Night was waxing, with the wee hours of the morning well under way. Everyone was asleep, all of them except Saida, who had been keeping an anxious watch over Quel.

"What is it?" Saida asked, concerned.

He was momentarily confused as to where and when he was, the vividness of the Day of Tears had been so real. Then he breathed deeply, putting fresh air into the depths of his lungs and stretched out the many kinks in his body. Consciousness returned slowly for Quel, his mind still fuzzy from how deeply it had dived.

"I remember who the Thief is," Quel croaked, just now realizing how dry his throat had become. Saida handed him a glass of water, which he guzzled down before continuing. "He was someone I knew very well a long time ago, when I was much younger."

"And?" Saida asked.

"His name is Carthas, he was one of the War Chiefs of my clan before he fell into darkness and was cast out."

"Oh," Saida said. "Let me guess, you were the reason he got cast out?"

"Yeah."

"And he's angry over that?"

"Consumed by it, I think," Quel said, getting up to his feet. "He died a long time ago and is now somehow back in the form of our psiforged."

"What's our game plan?" Saida asked. "Do we kill him again?"

"That's probably the most likely outcome to this," Quel said, a tad bitter about the whole situation. "He made my life miserable when I was under his tutelage and now I have to finish things between us."

"He was your master?"

"One of many at the Academy on Kotimaa," Quel clarified.

"You mean this place used to be..." Saida said, in dawning recognition.

Quel smiled. "Did you think I was raised out here by some weird sage, or something? No, this was once the core of the Kestävä tribe's civilization. We protected the Circle for hundreds of years... Until our doom.

"But enough reminiscing. Dusk is nearly here and we have a lot of work ahead of us."

* * *

The Vetus System held many dark memories for Dusk, or as he used to be known: Carthas. His lost life still plagued him with its unfulfilled meaning. And Quel... How he had ever forgotten the face of that filthy orpo he would never know, but to see him cast a Kidō spell had been enough to rouse all of his memories of the brat. Dusk was forced out of his dark reverie by one of his surviving accomplices, Shiran Lor, the Renegade Mastermaker of their party.

"Dusk, we've arrived at the final planet," he growled out in his baritone, metallic voice.

"Careful Shiran," teased Montrose Levix, the Master Summoner of their group. "Dusk is deep in thought. You shouldn't interrupt him. You remember what happened to Kardeski."

Shiran Lor grunted.

Endis Mevlan, the always mute necromancer of their group, did what he always did: nothing.

All four of them sat in the cramped cockpit of their small ship, the green glow coming from the display screens casting them in a ghoulish light.

"We will set down on Mt. Arvoa," Dusk said, almost to himself. Shiran guided the ship towards the peak Dusk indicated. They landed without incident and disembarked from their battered ship. Shiran had set them down on a small shelf of rock that stuck out near the peak. A constant light rain doused them and lightning flashed below at a lower elevation on the mountain. The rumble of thunder echoed grandly all around them constantly.

It was a short walk to their destination: the promenade of the Elder's Council, which meandered up the mountain until it reached the peak, where the Hall of the Ancestor's perched precariously on the very height of the mountain. The promenade used to be beautiful, with hanging flower gardens and artistic fountains spraying beautifully into the air. By ancient artisan techniques the Kestävä tribe had built a temple large enough to be a small city on top of the incredibly large summit of Mt. Arvoa. It was one of the most wondrous buildings within the entire Circle. No longer did it possess any of its former grandeur though. Lichen and vines, sickly and sparse at this altitude, clung to every stone surface and black flowers grew prolifically along the path. Unseen voices whispering too faintly to be heard. The dead wandered here in great numbers.

When they got to the Hall of the Ancestors Dusk immediately set up his equipment. His aim was to capture the long forgotten Kestävä goddess of the moon, Kalpea Äiti. He pulled forth from some hidden psionic pocket dimension his dark tool of severing.

"So it is a Regalia that allows you to kidnap the goddesses," said a familiar male voice from the darkened heights of the Hall.

Dusk laughed. "I knew you would show up eventually, but this soon? I assume you did an Unelma Sukellus Quel? That's quite the daring thing to do."

Quel Tiin dropped down out of the shadows that had concealed him, landing quietly and without effort on the balls of his feet. His damned affinity with the wind at work no doubt. Dusk tucked the regalia away inside his pocket dimension again and turned to face Quel.

"You still aren't prepared enough to face me and win," Dusk said calmly. It was weird. In that moment Carthas felt how alien and not real his personality as Dusk was compared to how he remembered himself as Carthas. This is not my true self. Then he shook it off and prepared to assault the filthy orpo until he was reduced to ashes.

Quel smiled, which was the signal for Saida, who was also hidden in the rafters, to set off their traps. He knew she had when the giant boulder they had hoisted up into the dark reaches of the Hall fell down with a profound whoosh to land atop Dusk's head. If he had been an ordinary robotic warrior he would have been flattened into slag, but he had armed himself in a psionic shell and was thus unharmed when the dust cleared to reveal the boulder had cracked over his head and become debris all around him.

Dusk summoned into being a gooey horde of psionic ape-like constructs that preceded to shuffle on all fours towards Quel with their fanged mouths open wide. They swarmed after him, his dancing retreat barely one step ahead of their clumsy pursuit. Dusk created a tall wall of ectoplasm behind Quel, which he didn't see until he slammed into it. The ape-things pounced on him and he had to unleash a large gust of wind to tear them all to shreds, showering ectoplasm all over the place as the constructs were reduced to fragments.

"Careful now," Dusk said into the silence. "You might overexert your seal."

"Not unlikely," Quel said, breathing a bit heavily. He smiled again and the next set of traps was unleashed upon them all. This time smaller boulders came plummeting at them from overhead. A whole landslides worth. Shiran and Montrose cried out in alarm, until Dusk raised his hands over his head and fired off such a large blast of psionic energy that every boulder was sent flying back the way it came, until a whole shower of them exploded out of the sides of the Hall of the Ancestors. The sound was deafening, the ground shook and dust fell from the ceiling.

Dusk then growled, or grumbled deep in his throat and a psychic shriek of extreme magnitude was released. Quel and his friends were rendered momentarily stupefied. Quel fell over and the others dropped where they were hiding. It was the same technique the cerebrilith had used on them back under Zakhara.

"Still grasping at ideas with no true foresight I see," Dusk said. The psiforged then activated another psionic power tha split his brain into two parts, allowing him to cast psionic techniques twice as fast as before.

"Recall why you cannot defeat me," Dusk mocked as Quel felt some force assault him and old wounds blossomed across his frame. A deep gash to his shoulder, a cut to his right leg, a hole in his stomach. Multiple wounds he had received, and remembered them vividly, began to appear again like they had never truly healed, blood flowing freely from them.

_Damned psionics!_ he silently raged. Raising his hands Quel aimed his pistols, which unfortunately because he followed the Developing Planets Act, had prevented him from coming into play until now. A storm of energy bullets hurtled at Dusk, showing why Quel was an unprecedented gunslinger in the Circle and beyond. The Thief took no damage from the many energy bullets, but they did knock him back with every impact. Quel was firing five shots a second and Dusk wasn't missing the brunt of any of them. The sheer number and concussive force of the many energy projectiles knocked him slowly back across the entire length of the room to be pressed into the wall.

Shiran Lor, Montrose Levix and Endis Mevlan prepared to attack Quel and met their own foes: Saida leaped out of the shadows to meet Montrose, Chuldo squared up against Shiran and Abir leaped out to attack Endis. "Hello Laddy," Chuldo grinned before aiming a vicious punch at the Renegade Mastermaker's head. Shiran blocked, and they began to trade multiple punches that most men would die if they received only one such blow. Saida growled and transformed into her beast form, making Montrose go wide eyed. She growled before leaping across the twenty foot gap that separated them. He screamed. Endis calmly invoked his powers and summoned forth, very rapidly, a shambling army of undead zombies, skeletons and wraiths. But, worst of all was what he summoned behind all of the lesser pests...

Dusk, growling in anger, unleashed two separate barrages against Quel. One was a hail of psionic homing darts imbued with lightning that no matter how Quel dodged them and continued to fire on the Thief, hit him directly in his chest. He faltered, coughing up blood, which was all the Thief needed to duck behind some cover. The broken masonry and pillars within the grand hall were all around them, providing ample cover. The next attack came in the form of a giant wave of psionic energy that rushed out of Dusk just as he ducked for cover. The wave was imbued with fire and scorched Quel's body and clothes as it knocked him flying across the room.

Saida hadn't made it in time to Montrose. He had managed to dodge her and summon in a flash two powerful creatures to fight in his stead. One was a black-green humanoid, roughly bigger than a regular human. It had a toothy grin, long razor sharp claws and glowing eyes. It was a pure predator that existed for the hunt. The five claws each hand possessed were about as long as a man's forearm. It was an Astral Stalker, though no one but Montrose knew that. Next to that disturbing creature stood something even more worrying. It had two large pointy fangs, a rodent's snout and a fluffy squirrel's tail, but that was where all association with what it had originally been ended. First of all it was so huge as to reduce the black-green manthing next to it to a speck. Second it was covered in a coat of verdant green moss and looked like Swamp Thing's ugly pet. It roared and dived at Saida, trying to swallow her whole. Endis' summoned champion stepped forth and tested Abir's mettle. It was a grey-skinned, humanoid, hairless and with sunken white pupiless eyes. Its face was twisted into an expression of sheer dark madness. Abir knew better than to look into its eyes. He summoned forth a giant blast of fire that incinerated the majority of Endis' zombies and skeletons, did nothing to his rapidly increasing horde of wraiths and made the champion recoil.

"You've upset my bodak." Endis remarked to himself. Abir didn't know how truly rare it was for Endis to speak more than one word, let alone four.

"I'll do more than that before I'm done," Abir quipped back.

Saida was able to avoid being eaten by the giant green mutant squirrel by doing a backwards leap. The giant squirrel's head slammed into the ground with an earth shattering explosion of rubble and debris. The green-black manthing fired darts from, his throat that Saida was able to easily dodge. Then a cold nothingness swept across the field of battle and everyone, except the undead, felt a touch of the void. Abir had invoked his voidsoul racial power and was harming everyone on the field.

Turning to see why, Quel saw a bodak bearing down on Abir. It was unaffected by his void power. Quel shot it three times in the head before turning back to fire on Dusk.

Chuldo tossed Shiran across the room to slam into one of the standing support pillars, which crumbled down atop Shiran, taking him out of the fight momentarily. Laughing, Chuldo turned to see Saida facing off against two beasties. He may not have been used to seeing her as a fearsome beast, but Quel had prepared him for the sight of her growling visage, fur and all. Chuldo charged in and attacked the Astral Stalker, it turned to face him. They met in a painfully loud collision of bodies. Two titans of muscle colliding head on.

Flau and Dong Dong hid in the shadows at the back of the Hall. This battle was way beyond their ability to fight in. They huddled together, afraid to do anything. Quel's three energy bullets had finally done some telling damage to the bodak, making it fall to its knees. Abir infused his fist with magma and punched the bodak, making a hole through it and showering it with magma. It die again, melting from the heat of the clinging liquid magma. Endis was now really ticked off and he showed this by summoning twice as many of his undead friends, even tossing in three blood amniotes (undead oozes that could suck the blood from someone faster than a vampire). All three slithered towards Abir rapidly. Chuldo wasn't faring so well against his foe. Not only were they nearly equal in strength, Chuldo being slightly stronger, but they were also uncannily similar in how they fought: all brawn, no subtlety. Finally Chuldo invoked his steel armor, causing it to erupt with spikes that tore into the manthing to create many mortal wounds. It disappeared and Chuldo assumed it had been banished back to wherever it had been summoned from, but in actuality it had used its inherent ability to turn invisible and was readying itself to strike one last blow. The giant green squirrel-mutant leaped at Saida again and missed, instead hitting the Hall's wall and causing the whole structure to shake. Chuldo turned to fight the giant thing alongside Saida. They had to kill it before it brought the whole building down on top of them all.

Quel teleported above Dusk and fired down rapidly with his dual pistols, hammering the psiforged into the ground until he fired a ball of energy up at Quel that knocked him flying up to smack solidly into the ceiling. Dazed, he fell towards Dusk again.

Shiran was finally able to free himself at that moment, shattering the large chunks of masonry that had been slowly suffocating him and leaping to his feet. He spotted Quel falling towards the ground and readied one of his magical wands to strike a deadly blow against Quel just as soon as he hit the ground.

The giant green squirrel mutant screamed in pain as Saida tore a huge swath of its flesh off and Chuldo unleashed a barrage of energy spears that riddled its body. It toppled over on its side, shattering the floor into many ripples of cracks around it and shaking the whole building before it vanished like a puff of smoke.

The invisible astral stalker chose that moment to launch its last attack, firing two paralyzing darts that hit Saida in the center of her back, making her cry out in surprise. She dropped on her haunches and then fell over, limp as a baby kitten but fully aware of her surroundings. Chuldo turned to see the astral stalker had become visible. It couldn't attack and remain invisible, so he smote it with a mighty barrage of his energy spears, which he called his Chulgab Attack. Its tattered remains faded away like dust in the wind.

Montrose laughed and summoned even more deadly beings to his service.

A giant worm like thing with a scaly, serpent-like body, spiky knobs along its sides, and a ring of wriggling tentacles all around its toothy maw. Comparatively speaking, it was the size of a freight train. It roared a piercing shriek that momentarily halted the battle and dislodged loose chunks of masonry all throughout the Hall. It was the physical form of Nature's rage: a hellion. The other summoned beast was a hydra even bigger than the hellion. It had four heads and stood on four dinosaur like legs and had a huge necklace of various species skulls. All four heads breathed a giant cloud of frost that froze a huge swath of the Hall and dropped the temperature in the whole giant room by thirty degrees. It was known as a cryohydra. Abir was caught square in the middle of the blast and was covered in a thick shell of ice. If it wasn't for his genasi heritage of flame, or his superb abilities, he would have died right there. Saida, still in her beast form, roared and leaped at the hellion's flank. She went into a frenzy, clawing and tearing out chunks of its molten hot hide. It managed to buck her from its back. She just kept on attacking, somehow unleashing the same shock waves she usually shot from her palms out of her cat mouth. They were twice as powerful and launched the hellion up into the air to slam with earth shattering intensity into the Hall's west wall. The whole structure swayed and teetered on the edge of collapse. Chuldo charged the cryohydra and managed to unleash his Chulgab Attack on it, reducing two if its four heads to shredded stumps. But the other two heads fixated on him and shrouded him in a cloud of frost.

Shiran Lor fired off a glob of acid that dispersed on the wind when it reached Quel. Quel landed on his feet, a protective shell of wind obscuring the air around him.

"Okotta Tatsumaki!" roared Quel at the top of his lungs before he conjured into being, with a wave of his blade, a giant tornado. It swept across the room, picked Shiran up like he was nothing and even managed to lift the hellion up off the floor before it hit the west wall, exploding out in a thousand currents of air that dispersed across the whole gigantic room, cleaning the air.

Dusk focused his mind on multiple chunks of debris and masonry all around Quel and filled them with psionic energy, exciting them to explode. They detonated with loud retorts, shrouding Quel and that side of the room in a big cloud of smoke and dust. The building was really coming down now, with large chunks of it raining down like a hellish version of hail.

Quel leaped from the cloud bloodied and battered, but whole. He unleashed a rapid barrage from his pistols, knocking Dusk to the ground again. It was then that Dusk replicated himself, twice. A threesome of evil black robots greeted Quel as he fired shot after shot.

Quel dodged to the right, still firing. But it was already too late, the rightmost Dusk turned into a giant tentacled horror and reached out to squeeze the life from him. The leftmost Dusk glowed and fired a beam of transparent energy that reduced the floor it passed over to dust. It sped rapidly towards Quel, quickly outdistancing the tentacled Dusk. The middle Dusk, however, turned away from the fight and summoned the device he had earlier been trying to use to trap and kidnap the moon goddess

One of the tentacles brushed against Quel's side, sending jolts of pain all up that side of his body and making him spasm automatically. The beam of energy was on top of him. Quel leaped out of the way, using his ability to stand on the air to boost him an extra five feet The beam impacted on the ground where he had just been standing and imploded, creating a perfectly symmetrical crater with a slowly falling cloud of dust being all that remained of the ground within the perimeter of the crater.

Across the room, Chuldo landed a deadly punch against the cryohydra that knocked it over backwards. Saida used this as an opportunity to pounce onto one of the two remaining heads and blind it by gouging out both of its eyes. The remaining head breathed a cone of frost onto her, which made her drop like a rock to land on the ground but also coated its blinded head in a shell of frost. The last head oriented on Saida and opened its jaws wide to swallow her whole. Chuldo grabbed its upper and lower jaws just as it was about to swallow her and grappled with them. He was forced backwards, sliding on his heels until he managed to get enough leverage to bring his colossal strength to bear. When that happened he slammed the cryohydra's head into the ground and whiplashing the rest of its body into the ground too.

Abir, meanwhile, had gathered sufficient energy to melt the shell of ice and hoarfrost off of his body in a mini explosion of flames that set on fire all of the undead skeletons and zombies who had been trying to claw their way through his icy shell. Endis fired insubstantial clawed hands that robbed Abr of his flames and nearly killed him from the sheer cold and power of the spell. Abir dropped to his knees, shivering uncontrollably, his corona of flame that he usually had instead of hair snuffed out completely. It left his bald head for all to see.

Chuldo was breathing heavily as the hydra faded away, just in time for the hellion to pass through its dissipating form to surprise Chuldo and knock him flying with a swing of its tail. He skyrocketed up and into the wall where he stayed due to the fact that his speed and weight had created quite a deep crater several feet up the wall, leaving his spiked armor embedded.

Montrose was standing off to the side, debating whether or not to summon another being to his aid when he spotted what the original Dusk was doing with the device to kidnap the moon deities. He gasped slightly and went to find Shiran.

Saida rose to her feet rigidly and with a roar, sent a powerful shock wave from her mouth towards the hellion worm that knocked it back slightly. Then it spat a glob of molten liquid at her that she only barely managed to dodge out from under.

A blinding light, very suddenly, expanded from the device Dusk was holding up. It seemed to make the very atoms reverberate strangely, almost like it was pulling and pushing the substance of the universe down to the smallest levels of life. Every fight stopped. Even the mindless undead paused to cower before this light. Every eye turned to look upon the impossible.

An evanescent female figure, beauty personified, wisdom and compassion incarnate, appeared through the ceiling and fell slowly, and gracefully, towards the device in Dusk's outstretched hand. It was Kalpea Äiti, the Kestävä goddess of the moon, secrets, destiny and knowledge. With eyes quickly fading to motes of light, quickly sinking into the depths of the regalia Dusk was using evilly, she locked eyes with Quel and spoke to him and him alone.

The entire Hall was moving disturbingly, bending and flexing unnaturally. Within mere moments the entire structure would collapse on top of them all. Quel knew Dusk had already won by stalling him with his two copies, so instead of trying to continue the fight Quel looked for his allies and began planning on how he was going to save them all from the nearly collapsed building.

Montrose ran to Dusk with Shiran right behind him. Endis had conjured, nonstop, over two hundred shambling undead to hinder his enemies. Because of this Endis, Shiran and Montrose managed to reach Dusk unmolested by the companions. The tentacled version of Dusk simply vanished, as did the other copy. The hellion followed them a moment later, which left only the undead to fight.

Dusk smiled mirthlessly, locking eyes with Quel who hadn't moved since his very brief words with the goddess. Dusk and his entourage vanished in the blink of an eye.

Quel knew they had seconds to live or die. "EVERYONE TO ME!"

Chuldo arrived with Flau and Dong Dong, slightly out of breath. The two girls now out of hiding. Abir, chilled to the bone, arrived soon after. His head was still without fire. All of them gathered around Quel. Saida had returned to her humanoid form and lay exhausted in the middle of the room. Around her the group formed a small circle. He wrapped them in wind as the ceiling fell and the walls buckled.

In one fell swoop he whisked them away, out of the tower and back down the mountain.

Two days later they drifted through the outer reaches of the Vetus System with no clear idea of where to go next or on how to stop Dusk from completing his unknown scheme. They had no leads, no good guesses on where to look, nothing. They were without doubt at a dead end. Everyone turned to Quel on what to do next, but he was as clueless as they were. All he had to go one were the three words his goddess had spoken to him right before she had been abducted:

_"Sudenkorennot kohti Ovet."_

_Dragonflies towards the Doors._

What the hell does that even mean?!


	23. 22 The Sage

**Chapter Twenty Two: The Sage**

**Minegarde, Dondruma Town, February 18th, 1392 a.c.**

At times like this, when Quel found himself without any leads to follow, he had few alternatives. Most adventurers or even bounty hunters had a certain type of person with a unique skill set to pay a visit. Informants, information sellers and such ilk were much sought after and not just by the disenfranchised. If such people existed that could barter in information of gods and god thieves... well then gravity might as well decide to take a day off. It was impossible and beyond contemplating. Still... the gears in Quel's mind began wrapping around this idea and they turned out a rather out there conclusion. He was grasping at straws, but that was all he had.

With said idea in mind, Quel led his small band to a world less remote than Vetus Prime, but one that was still rarely mentioned in the annals of history: Minegarde. He sought a man that had helped him once in the past, long ago before the majority of the current ages living memory, back in another time... Hopefully the guy was still alive! Regardless, he had to try. So with resignation in his heart Quel guided their little ship with his small band to the world of Minegarde. The Developing Planets Act was in full force on Minegarde, so no technology. This was a world steeped in it's own reputation. Only the bold and the foolish sought out this wild planet. It was was a world of monsters and the people who hunted them. On this planet hardy bands of people gathered together to fend off the fearsome wyverns, neopterans and other mighty fauna that roamed the landscape. Quel guided them through the city of Loc Lac, onto a desert caravan of sand skiffs, that took them across the Great Desert, to the large city of Dondruma, where he hoped to find some trace of his old cohort.

What he found instead was the overgrown ruins that was all that remained of his hut. His friend had vanished. Quel rented out a room for everyone to stay in with his quickly depleting funds and began to turn over every stone in Dondruma looking for his old friend Rishi. Days passed with no results. Chuldo got a part time job as a smith's apprentice and began helping out around town as Quel continued digging for facts. A week passed idly by like this with nothing significant happening. Then one day a traveling peddler wandered into town. He knew of Quel's old friend and had actually been quite close with him. Rishi, if that was what the old hermit who had lived in the hut beyond town had been called, had long ago moved on, but he had left a note with the peddler for Quel.

Quel was a bit stunned by this turn of events, but he recognized the handwriting on the envelop and knew beyond a shadow of a doubt it was Rishi's hand that had scrawled it. The peddler gave Quel the letter without anything more than a chuckle and a nod of his head before he continued through Dondruma with his ponderous pack swaying on his shoulders. Opening the letter carefully, so as not to damage it, for it looked positively ancient, Quel read ravenously.

_Dear Quel,_

_It has been some time since we last met and even though by all accounts and purposes you should be dead, my throwing bones tell me otherwise. Wherever you are I hope you are faring well and are not tangling with flying foxes. If by some chance this letter does reach you, and I am writing it on durable paper in the off chance it does, then I wish you the best. I know you have only come seeking me again because you are stumped over something truly ghastly and I want no part in it. But if it is something that you feel requires my attention then I will give you a means of contacting me. Simply travel to Pokke and talk to Treshi. He's a distant cousin of mine and should know where I am. The last I heard he was heading out that way to start his own treasure hunting business. The daft fellow's obsessed with the stuff. If you are in need of my help and Treshi is dead of old age then I must apologize for he is younger than me by a few years and, thus, I must also have passed on. Anyway, take care of yourself my friend. I will definitely see you again, in this life or the next._

_-Rishi_

Now with a target to head towards Quel gathered everyone up and held a group meeting. They all agreed on a plan of action and split up into two groups. Chuldo and Dong Dong would stay behind and then follow a day later, but Quel, Saida, Flau and Abir were all heading out on another caravan, this time towards the frostbitten town of Pokke. Pokke was famous for its giant malachite chunk as well as its world class hunters. It took them days of travel that bled into two weeks by caravan. From city to city they traveled until they reached the foothills of the Fury Mountains and the final climb to Pokke.

Treshi was senile, old enough to have tufts of white hair coming out of his ears and nine tenths of the way blind, but he still knew where Rishi was and gave them specific directions to an outrageous place. It was another long and boring trip to find him...

* * *

"This is where he lives?!" Saida asked in exasperation.

They were standing at the foot of a giant tree in the Great Forest. They were in the very heart of this sea of trees. It had been three long weeks since they had visited Pokke. Minegarde was a vast world with much of it being untamed and uncharted. The Great Forest had only roughly been mapped and Rishi had picked one of the rougher spots for his home. Only Saida had been willing to follow Quel out to the boondocks and beyond and even now she was half regretting it.

"Apparently so," Quel replied quietly. He didn't know what to expect when he found his old friend again. It had been so long since they had last seen one another...

Inside the giant tree they found that parts of the trunk were hollow and full of twisting passages. Quel led the way down a maze of bisecting woody corridors covered in lichen and an insubstantial aura of mist. After what felt like days inside the tree they arrived at a small room located in the very heart of the trees roots. The very darkest depths of its deepest roots, some hundred or more feet underground. Inside this tiny room of earth there was a small fire that crackled away merrily, somehow giving off barely any smoke at all. Two tapestries hung along the left and right walls flanking the entrance, one a deep blue depicting sea monsters and the other a deep red depicting volcanic monsters. At the opposite end of the room where a long stalactite hung down to drip into a small pitch black pool of clear water, hunched an ancient man who seemed to be half made out of the rocks he meditated upon. Without looking up or moving he spoke to them.

"Long have I waited for someone to find me and break up the monotony in this place, but never did I expect it to be you Quelly boy."

"Hello Rishi," Quel said, a boyish smile creeping onto his face.

"And why do you have to smile? You're just here to bring me misfortune you miscreant." Rishi was smiling too. He turned and looked at Saida. "And who's this gorgeous girl you have with you?" he asked, still smiling. ("Is she single?")

"Her name's Saida and she, along with a few more people, have been traveling with me recently." Quel sighed heavily and cut to the chase. "Rishi we have a big problem we need your help with."

"Tell me something I don't know," Rishi replied sardonically. "Start from the beginning."

Quel, with Saida sometimes interrupting to add something he had forgotten, told the whole story from start to finish, leaving out nothing. Nothing Saida already didn't know anyway.

Rishi had been silent throughout the entire story and hadn't really moved even since they had arrived and sat near him to talk. "That is quite a problem," he finally said. "I think I'll have to travel with you for awhile just to make sure everything turns out for the best."

Quel was surprised. "You're coming with us?" he asked lamely.

"Of course," Rishi said, now finally rising from his sitting position. Multiple joints cracked within the cantankerous old wyverian and Saida saw for the first time how truly old he was. Rishi was positively ancient and possessed a little white hair on the back of his head in a tiny ponytail. His skin was weathered, wrinkled and browned by countless years under the sun. He had a smile on his face whenever he wasn't pondering some mystery beyond the ken of mortal thought. The wrinkles on his face moved like the waves of some leathery ocean, with detail enough in them to match any atlas. Such was his enlightenment that little to nothing ever eluded his eye. His clothes were sturdy and tattered just enough to be fashionable. He carried a pack with him always and it contained everything and anything he could ever possibly need in any given situation. Wyverians were one of the more interesting species within the confines of the Circle and for that matter beyond it as well. They lived to be around 1,300 years old on average and possessed clawed hands and feet as well as pointy and floppy elfin ears. But the most defining feature of their species was how they grew. Wyverians got their name by being the size of a wyvern, a large dragon, at the prime of their lives. You see wyverians started out slightly smaller than humans and grow and grow until they are as large as houses. Then they shrink again until they are the size of small children. Usually they returned to their homeland, the Wyverian Hub, when they grew too large to live in human lands. They were possessed of brilliance and many of the wonders of science and ingenuity on Minegarde could directly be attributed to wyverian minds. They were the very best smiths too, having forged the greatest weapons on Minegarde. Lastly, but not least, they were the last descendants of the Dragon Tribe, the ancient and mythical race that had first populated Minegarde millennia ago and just as mysteriously as they had arrived, vanished into the mists of time. Wyverians were very magical in their own right and Rishi was no different. He cracked all his joints numerous times, gathered together what he needed for the trip, doused his mini fire, made sure his small abode was in order and donned traveling clothes before joining Quel and Saida for the journey back. This all took less than five minutes.

Saida was impressed "You could teach lessons on readiness old timer."

Rishi smiled happily. "Thank you Saida."

* * *

When they arrived back in Pokke they found everyone waiting for them. A quick round of introductions introduced Rishi to everyone and then they all waited one more day for the courier ship to arrive from the orbital station to pick them up. Villagers came to gawk at them and the children of the village passed the time playing games with each other and hoping for a chance to see a mysterious "sky ship" come down to pick them up. During this time of waiting Rishi found Quel sitting by the town farm one day and had a talk with him.

"I need to talk with you about something Quel." Rishi said, sitting down next to Quel.

"What about Rishi?" Quel replied.

"Though it has been a considerable amount of time since we last met I have noticed two very apparent things have changed with you since we last parted."

Quel suddenly grew uncomfortable and shifted his weight.

"Know what I'm going to say, do you?" Rishi teased. "You haven't really aged very much, which means you have either suspended your natural lifespan through some means or you somehow skipped forwards through time. Whatever the cause is it hasn't done much that I can tell, but the second thing I noticed was that you seem to have lost almost all of the power you possessed so long ago."

Quel remained silent, his mouth remained firmly closed.

"Whatever has happened to drain you so, my friend, is none of my business. All I am trying to tell you is that from what you've told me you aren't up to snuff for what must be done to defeat this Thief."

A silence developed between them, the sounds of the surrounding land blending into a symphony that closed over them.

Rishi sighed. "And if my gut is even half right we haven't seen the full might of this Dusk character."

Quel knew the truth of his words, probably even more than Rishi knew them. The closing act of this chase across the entire Circle was about to come to an end and Quel wasn't convinced it would turn out in his favor.

Rishi was able to do what all of them combined could not: find the Thief's trail again. Using a small sliver of Dusk's galvanic steel blade that had been lodged in Quel's body from their encounter on Dalamud, Rishi was able to tell them which direction to go in. He didn't share how he did this, nor did anyone dare ask. Something about Rishi was imposing. Like the fact that he moved around with the agility of a young man in his clearly ancient and decaying body, or the piercing glint his eyes possessed. There was something about him that conveyed the need to be cautious.

They headed for the tether and jumped through it, and when they got the the other side Rishi would begin to douse for Dusk's trail again. Many times they did this, until with a happy exclamation Rishi pinpointed Dusk's location on the holographic map of the Circle that floated over the gameboard Chuldo had half installed on his ship. The world was Bionicle. Aside from the name and location of this world nothing much was known about it. It was one of the few Forbidden Worlds and under countless sanctions preventing anyone from just wandering onto it by accident. On top of that it had a barrier around it that stopped all access to the world.

"It's impossible to get onto that world," Saida remarked.

"Not impossible." Rishi said. "Just inhospitable, improbable and idiotic."

Saida looked from Quel to Rishi, suddenly seeing the closeness they both had with each other. Her mind was full of thoughts over what had happened between them before she had met Quel. From what she could tell they had met a long, long time ago. But Quel wasn't older than thirty at best, so how did he know this old manthing from so long ago?

Rishi sensed her attention and gave her a big innocent old man smile, which she didn't buy for a minute. Something was nagging at the back of her mind, but she just didn't know what it was. Back in the conversation Flau was leaning forward on the game table to ask a question.

"There's a way in?" she asked.

"Yes." Quel replied. "But it isn't well known and it's hard to navigate."

"It's a good thing you know how to fly this sky ship then," Rishi remarked to Quel.

Quel's eyes were fixated on the glowing dot that was the world of Bionicle on the map.

"We need to stop somewhere else first," Quel said almost to himself. "We'll need supplies for this."

"Lots of them." Rishi agreed.

* * *

Koreva was a world dominated by settlers from Citadel Space and the Alliance of the New Covenant and the UNSC. As such it was a very advanced planet, technologically speaking. It had a Black Market hub in a darker section of the vast metropolis that made up most of its surface. The Narrows is what this hub of black dealings is called. It is a haven for all those inclined to breaking the law. Only the foolish dared to cross the kingpins of this small kingdom of crime and so much crime was allowed to flourish here unhindered. It was here that Quel somehow found three nynrah ghostblasters and three cordak blasters. They were unlike any guns any of the crew, aside from Quel, had ever seen. Their ammo was unique in its own right as well. These weapons were a puzzle to the crew, all of whom had never been to the world of Bionicle. Even Rishi was puzzled by them, though he remained silent about it. Quel also bought seven powerless kanohi masks that equally puzzled his companions.

Small side trip finished, Quel guided the Yahosun towards the world of Bionicle and the final showdown that awaited them all there. As they sped towards the tether that connected Koreva to Radiata and from there to Bionicle itself, Quel had one final bit of advice:

"When we get to Bionicle our bodies are going to go through a change to stay aligned with the world's own Laws of Alignment. Don't be afraid of what will happen. Embrace the change and know that it will only last as long as we stay within the realm of the Bionicle."

No one quite knew what to do with that little tidbit of info, so they all remained quiet.

* * *

It was late at night in what passed for a night cycle on the _Yahosun_. Saida couldn't sleep and it wasn't because of Chuldo's rumbling snores, or the odd crackling sound of Abir's hair, like it was flame in a fireplace, nor was it because of Rishi's odd gurgling snores with the large snot bubble that expanded and retracted into and out of his nose again and again and...no it was none of that. She could not sleep because she felt Quel was keeping something to himself, which wasn't new. He kept his past and all its many twists and turns that had landed him in her life very private, hardly sharing anything. She hoped that would change in the future, but could do nothing until then. This time it was different though. It felt like Quel was going to be leaving her and that was a very frightening thought. Why was it frightening? She didn't know that either, but being made of stubborn stuff she wasn't about to let him go without a fight.

Silently getting up from where she and everyone else slept comfortably, though cramped, in sleeping bags on the floor in the lounge of the ship, she crept towards the cockpit where Quel slumbered uncomfortably in the pilot's chair.

"Quel...?" she whispered.

He stirred and looked at her in surprise. Apparently he had been deep in thought. "Yes Saida?" he asked back equally as quiet. His eyes were drooping from exhaustion and seemed to be staring off far away.

"How are you planning on stopping Dusk?" She bluntly asked.

Quel blankly looked at her. "Why do you ask?" he finally replied cautiously, some caution returning to his exhausted brain.

"Because I know you well enough by now to guess you have something crazy planned."

He smiled. "You're one hell of a woman, you know that?"

"Don't compliment me!" she grumbled. "Tell me what it is you're going to do!"

"Ah but if I told you that you'd only try and stop me," he remarked sadly. "And if that happens we are all likely dead."

Saida furrowed her brow. "You're just saying that." She remarked. "You still don't trust me?"

"No, I do." Quel ran his hands through his hair thinking of what to say. "I just don't really have anything specific planned," he lied.

Saida knew he was lying, but she let it go. "You suck Quel," she teased. He didn't have anything smart to say to that, so he remained quiet. She got in his lap and nestled down on top of him. They both stayed like that in the pilot's chair until their arrival in the Bionicle system.

As he lay there with Saida on top of him, both of them in blissful sleep, Quel Tiin dreamed of days gone by and days yet to come. He saw ancient kingdoms only he remembered get swept away by tides of flame, ghosts watched over an ancient barrow mound that reeked of sins and death. Under the light of a red moon the Willbearer will finally cast off his chains and be remade, allowing the End of it all to finally come to pass. A city enslaved by an evil god holds the imprisoned deities, the sky falls down to crush the god's brain, karma in motion, all is undone. Only one slim opportunity to save it all, the battle is not in your favor, and there is only one last chance to salvage it all.

With a small start Quel jolted awake, the nightmare still clinging to him even conscious as he was now. Saida stirred on top of him, but aside from a small groan in her sleep, did not awaken. He was glad for this because she needed her sleep as much as he did. Unfortunately grim knowledge kept Quel from having a deep restful sleep. He sat there pondering his future as the _Yahosun_ sped onwards towards Bionicle. Many threads that had been sown into his past were now about to meet in his near future. So many things were coming together and not all of them were good.


	24. 23 Havoc and A Hydra

**Chapter Twenty Three: Havoc and A Hydra**

**The Great Spirit, Somewhere on the Silver Sea, February 22nd 1392 a.c.**

They couldn't get to Bionicle easily because a powerful shield surrounded it, but Quel knew of a hidden way to get past this barrier and he piloted his ship adroitly through it. The barrier was invisible, so Quel's ability to pilot through the hidden path on memory alone was quite impressive. Not only was the route he took completely secret, but if word of it ever got out fortune seekers would flock to Bionicle to try and earn some profit from the mysterious world. When they got past the barrier (Quel told them they had because they couldn't see it at all.) he stopped the ship and put it on autopilot. It was surprising to him that such an archaic ship, made of wood with a force bubble around it to provide oxygen, even had an autopilot function. He set it on a slow course towards the watery world known as Aqua Magna, where the Great Spirit Robot lay and therein the Moon Thief.

The _Yahosun_ guided them safely down onto the planet, and it was a good thing that it did because everyone inside the ship was too busy to pilot. As soon as they entered the atmosphere of the planet their bodies underwent a "change." Flesh and bone gave way to an organic/bio-mechanical form, their stature shrank until they were the size of children and their skin changed color to match unknown aspects of their nature. Quel's turned shades of green, Saida's turned blue and white, Flau's turned blue, Dong Dong's turned brown and yellow, Chuldo's turned black, Abir's turned red and Rishi's turned grey and black. Everyone had fallen to the floor and lost momentary control over their bodies as they underwent the big shift. Overwhelming didn't even begin to describe it. But after a period of time spent gasping and adjusting to their new bodies they all got shakily to their feet and looked at each other in profound stupefaction.

"Put your masks on!" Quel said urgently, donning his.

Everyone put on their masks and immediately noticed a difference in how they felt, one so subtle yet all encompassing that they had at first failed to notice any difference at all. The syphoning of vitality and energy that had been leaking slowly out of them stopped and they could feel their new bodies with renewed clarity.

"What have we become?" Saida said, breaking the deep stillness that had gripped them all.

"Matoran. The main species on this world," Quel replied calmly.

"Why are we all different colors?" asked Flau.

"We are all different types of Matoran," Quel replied. "I'm an Air, or Le-Matoran... I think. Saida is, uh... A Vo-Matoran, a Matoran of Lightning, Flau is a Ga-Matoran of Water, Chuldo is an Onu-Matoran of Earth, Dong Dong is a Po-Matoran of Rock and Abir is a Ta-Matoran of Fire."

"And me?" Rishi asked. "What element does my personality have an affinity to?"

Quel gave Rishi a once over. "I think you're a De-Matoran of Sonics, or Sound."

"Perfect!" Rishi exclaimed happily, "I like my element."

Everyone mutely looked at him and each other.

"Why does Rishi look different from us?" asked Saida. "He looks almost hunchbacked...?"

"That's because he's come here before and is not a Matoran but a Turaga."

"Say what now?" Flau asked.

"The Turaga are the final stage of Matorans."

"So we have stages of growth?" Abir asked.

"Not really. Most Matoran never change. Only the rare few become Toa and protect the Matoran Universe and it's even rarer for them to live to become Turaga."

The large amount of new information was overwhelming the companions.

"Rar'er to live?" Dong Dong asked in a small voice.

"Don't worry, I brought us enough weaponry to ensure we can handle almost anything." Now Quel brought out the cordak blasters and the nynrah ghostblasters and gave a brief explanation of their capabilities. Cordak blasters used air pressure to fire small bullets that would impact explosively with whatever they hit. Nynrah ghostblasters were even more powerful, for they harnessed the wielder's thoughts and manifested them into whatever they could think of. For example a shield, a weapon or almost anything the user can imagine.

"Now we have these blasters , we can defend ourselves. We are on the world in the vicinity of Dusk..." He stopped to look at Rishi for clarification. Rishi nodded. "All we need to do is find him and his allies and then we finish this once and for all"

"Which be no easy task lad!" Chuldo exclaimed, his now smaller stature not diminishing his blustering.

"We'll manage." Saida said cockily and not without merit.

The landing ramp retracted and left them with all the mysteries of this new world to discover.

* * *

Some worlds in the Circle shaped whoever entered their domains. These worlds were known as Shifter Planets, or simply Shifters. The changes were usually bodily and consisted of molding the traveler's body into a shape more suited to the world. This was more prevalent in the Realm of Doors back when it had been open to visitors and not closed up like it had been for the past twenty-six years. The transformations were varied, with our heroes transformation from fleshy beings into bio/organic metal beings being a normal and expected one. Shifters were viewed with no small amount of fear and suspicion and were usually avoided at all cost. This was one reason Bionicle, with all of its mystery and promise, was a forbidden world. More on Shifters later, now back to the main story.

* * *

They stood bunched together on the bottom of the landing ramp staring out at a vast silvery sea with the occasional giant stone pillar jutting up out of the water into the upper reaches of the sky. It was ocean and jagged pillars as far as the eye could see. The Yahosun had guided them through one of the two holes above the Protodermis Sea and had deposited them somewhere in this vast ocean away from Metru Nui. All of this Quel explained to them after he looked over the ship's nav display.

"Now what?" Flau asked rhetorically.

"We swim, I guess," Quel replied.

And so, with much grumbling, they all dove off the side of the ship and swam towards the city on the far horizon. The distance was deceiving . Two hours came and went with them still afloat and beginning to get exhausted. Their new bodies endured far longer than their fleshy ones had. Still, fatigue started to wear away at them, gnawing on their resolve and their bodies. Halfway there they were flagging and seemed on the verge of drowning.

"What a way to go," said Flau, gasping with every other word. "Drowning as a robotic midget. I never saw it coming."

"Easy now," Quel said, also gasping. "We can do this!"

"Bite me," Saida said sarcastically, her breathing far less struggled than everyone else's.

They wouldn't last much longer, so Quel guided them all to a pillar that had a ledge they could hang onto to catch their breath. It was nothing but open water from where they were to the city. They had encountered no signs of life on this world, only water and rock. It took them some time to recover. Apparently they didn't need food in these new bodies, or at least not as much as they had before. Having only been Matoran for a scant few hours they couldn't yet tell. After they had recuperated on the ledge for over an hour, building up their endurance, Quel urged them all out into the water again.

With one final effort they managed to force themselves to swim across the last long stretch of the sea and arrived three quarters of the way dead. After recovering, they eagerly continued until they beheld the city on this strange new world. Metru Nui was a city unlike any they had encountered on their long journey. Colossal buildings larger than any skyscraper dominated the sky, airships of all sizes floated majestically through the air, and tubes ran criss-crossing all throughout the city, with packages and Matoran using these tubes as a means of rapid transit. Throughout this city the sounds of industry echoed as the Matoran went about their peaceful days, preserving their way of life. However, today was not peaceful by any means.

Dominating this urban vista was something else far more pressing. The city was, ironically, in the midst of some sort of upheaval. Hundreds of flying armored serpentine warriors were flying around the city and corralling the multitudes of its Matoran citizens, all of whom were in a state of panic.

"Rahkshi!" hissed Quel. He made everyone duck down behind outcroppings of rock on the shore.

"Rock sheep!?" Chuldo gasped. "Don't be daft boy. Those be demons!"

Quel fixed Chuldo with a glare. "Rahkshi are a type of worm creature that reside in those suits of armor. That's what is flying around terrorizing the Matoran."

"So what do we do now?" asked Flau. Chuldo was properly abashed and was muttering to himself until Dong Dong kicked him in the shin, making him cry out. Everyone ignored them both.

"We blend in," Rishi said, "Act terrorized," He gestured at Quel. "I'll lead the way." Raising his arms, Rishi ran off screaming like a fear-crazed lunatic. Saida glanced briefly at Quel before shaking her head and plunging after him. Everyone followed behind.

They had come ashore in Le Metru, the Le-Matoran city district on the southeastern side of the city. The large and beautiful metropolis that was Metru Nui was eclipsed by the current state of terror that gripped it. It was an urban paradise full of many incredible things to see and experience but at the moment it was nothing except a hot mess. Quel wished he could have taken his companions here at a better time so they could have seen the true beauty of this wondrous City of Legends. Chaos was everywhere as they trekked through the city and numerous times rahkshi came a little too close for comfort. They all pretended fear and stuck close to groups of Matoran, but as time went by all of the Matoran were being herded towards their assigned workplaces and being forced to continue about their daily business, though under duress and strict monitoring. Rishi led them deeper and deeper into the heart of the city, towards the giant mountain that was the Coliseum.

It was now unavoidable to evade the rahkshi and they were soon attracting the attention of quite a few of them.

"Are we getting close?" Quel asked with apprehension as multiple rahkshi began to take notice of them.

"Almost on top of him!" Rishi replied while running ahead of everyone. "He's in that coliseum!"

Rahkshi began to pour out of the sky and jump out of hiding from around every corner. They weren't there to socialize.

"Open fire!" Quel yelled. "Keep running!"

The cordak blasters tore holes into the surrounding buildings, when they missed, and took out one rahkshi with only one shot, blasting great big holes in them. The nynrah ghostblasters had varying effects, ranging from shields of energy and light manifesting in the air to protect them, to giant fists of energy smashing rahkshi and blades of all types and sizes slicing into the rahkshi. But it wasn't enough. Soon they were completely surrounded, with no way to retreat, and right at the entrance to the coliseum as well. The rahkshi began to close in for the kill, coming closer with every passing second.

Quel suddenly had an insane idea. "Aim at the coliseum entrance!" he shouted, frantically pointing at his companions who had cordak blasters. They did so and a barrage of explosions made the entrance collapse in a huge plume of dust and debris, masking everything. Quel and his companions were shrouded in this cloud as well, momentarily losing sight of the hordes of rahkshi closing in on them, now only a few yards away.

"Now aim at the ground beneath our feet and let it have it!"

"Are you crazy?!" Flau yelled.

"Open fire!" Saida yelled with relish, clearly enjoying herself.

Following his advice, even though it sounded potentially suicidal, all three people holding cordak blasters quickly blasted a large hole into the ground. When the hole was large enough and deep enough for them to not see the bottom anymore Quel had them stop shooting and jump down into it. The whole task took less than a minute, all told. Rahkshi swarmed through the cloud of dust after them, but the members of the team wielding the ghostblasters managed to fend them off. They all leaped into a darkness that made Saida, Flau and Quel remember the Underdark with a twinge. Hopefully nothing as bad as that would occur within the depths of this place.

Now they found themselves in an underground tunnel that stretched beyond their sight in two directions: forwards towards the coliseum and backwards towards the city proper. They could hear the rahkshi following them, so they blindly fired their blasters over their heads and ran for the coliseum, shards of masonry falling all about them. Through the darkness they went, blind and trusting in Rishi's trace on the Thief. Sounds of pursuit echoed behind them as the rahkshi gave chase. More than once they banged painfully against the tunnel walls as it twisted and turned. Rishi led them down many twisting corridors in the pitch dark, guiding them unerringly. After what felt like hours, but was probably only fifteen or so minutes, they saw a speck of light ahead of them. It was blinding to their dilated eyes.

The tunnel spilled out onto the main floor of the giant Coliseum itself. Rishi was the first out onto the main floor of the coliseum. Everything was eerily quiet, a surreal stillness gripping this section of the city. No sounds of pursuit came from behind them, the rahkshi undoubtedly lurking in the darkness back the way they had come.

"I can't believe you found me," echoed a familiar voice from high overhead. Looking up they saw Dusk looking down on them all. Unlike the rest of them he had remained in the form of a psiforged. His three allies, in Matoran form, stood beside him on a balcony overlooking the entire coliseum and the stands where Matoran would gather to watch the games.

"It ends now Carthas," Quel said loudly enough for everyone to hear.

A device was erected in the exact center of the vast arena. It looked like a telescope to the untrained eye, but was in fact a giant cannon. The device Dusk had used to capture all of the lunar gods and goddesses was placed in the base of the cannon. They had arrived almost too late, the cannon finishing with its countdown. Without needing to be told, everyone fired their blasters. A giant fist of light slammed down on top of Dusk and his allies, and would have knocked them flat if Dusk hadn't been projecting a psionic shell that shielded them from the attack. Cordak shells impacted on the cannon and did little damage to it. Blades of energy sliced at Dusk's shell but accomplished nothing.

Smiling, Quel aimed and fired the kanoka disk launcher he had tripped over in the tunnels. It had been an incredibly lucky thing to find in the pitch dark. His disk hit the balcony and weakened its integrity so much so that it collapsed. Dusk and his cohorts fell towards the arena floor, until he whisked them all away with a sudden teleport spell. They reappeared at the base of the cannon.

"You seem well prepared," Dusk remarked. Hordes of rahkshi came pouring over the rim of the Coliseum. "But you seem to be out of time." Rahkshi began to rain down their prospective abilities: bolts of lightning, beams of heat, beams of shattering and disintegration, a power scream that dazed all in its path. Chuldo and Abir became enraged and turned on each other when one beam hit them, grappling with each other instead of shooting one another. There was a bright side somewhere in there because of that. The rahkshi unleashed all sorts of abilities., overwhelming our little band almost instantaneously. Things seemed to be ending catastrophically for them all on that day.

Cordak blasters and nynrah ghostblasters hammering away at the rahkshi hordes was only going to buy them another few seconds. Quel needed to use that time to fix their problem, but Dusk wasn't going to allow him to do that. Psionics worked fine on Bionicle and Dusk created a mote of energy that sped towards Quel and his companions and detonated thunderously, making one of the biggest explosions Quel had seen in ages. All of his allies and he himself were knocked flat. Things really couldn't get any worse as the rahkshi closed in with everyone knocked out of the fight.

And then they did.

The rahkshi surrounded them, closing off all means of escape. Without warning, and catching everyone by surprise, wild rahi stormed up from out of the depths of the tunnels leading into the vast arena, causing even more chaos. They stampeded through the arena, squashing rahkshi flat and making the majority of the horde have to turn and face this new threat or get annihilated then and there. On top of all this Quel felt a cold feeling grow in his chest that felt like ice and was, oxymoronically, growing too hot to bear. Everyone kept firing their blasters and backing up to form a circle, back to back with each other. A small fragile hope had blossomed in their hearts, giving them the strength to continue against all odds. Abir and Chuldo had both regained their senses and stood with everyone else in this last stand. Things looked bleak. Dusk strode forwards calmly.

Then the cold-hot feeling in Quel's chest exploded, nearly knocking him unconscious from the force of it. Energy ripped out of him and formed a giant portal that began to suck everything and everyone up in the vicinity. Quel was at a complete loss as to where this portal had come from and how it had manifested, but didn't really pause to consider it as he lost consciousness. Dusk and his allies were swallowed as well as all of the companions; the cannon Dusk had been about to fire was also pulled in, some rahi were even accidentally sucked in. Just like a black hole, everything in the arena, including the floor around the portal and cannon, was all consumed by the yawning maw of the shrieking gateway.

Through time and space they were torn, transported and relocated to somewhere entirely different. Far, far away...

* * *

Disoriented and stunned, Quel focused his senses and tried to understand where they had all been transported to. He felt the wind stir his clothes and hair, touching his skin and caressing him on its way. He realized with sudden shock he was a human again, or near enough anyway. They were no longer within the realm of Bionicle.

Groaning in pain, for his whole body felt like it had been squashed, Quel rose to his feet slowly. He was alone, they had all been scattered. He stood on the branch of some structure that seemed like a mountain, until he walked to the edge and looked down and saw the truth: he was on a tree as large as the world itself. Branches as large as mountains, the green of their colossal leaves a dark emerald in hue, spread out all around him. Without much effort he knew where he was: the World Tree in the Astral Plane on Toril.

"My plans are in ruins," echoed Dusk's voice from overhead.

Looking up Quel could see Dusk floating down until he stood opposite Quel on the tree. They eyed each other in silence for a long time, neither one of them wanting to begin quite yet.

"Why did you do it?" Quel asked finally. "What was the purpose of kidnapping all of these deities?"

Dusk laughed. "You wouldn't comprehend my plan even if I told it to you piece by little piece. Torment yourself with the knowledge that it was never within your grasp."

"Big words for someone on the brink of utter defeat!"

Dusk shrugged. "Ah, but I am not yet defeated, am I? You will never be able to stop me at your current level of power, filthy little orpo."

"Then it's a good thing I can up the ante, isn't it?" Quel smiled as Dusk gave him a blank look. "Thank you for weakening my seal Carthas!" He charged the psiforged, drawing forth Kaze no Koe. In this realm thought gave way to motion so that you only had to think of where you wanted to go for it to happen.

"DO NOT CALL ME BY THAT NAME!" Dusk screamed in insane rage. "FILTHY ORPO!"

They met in a flurry of clashing blades, Dusk's galvanic steel blade and hook blade meeting Quel's zanpakuto head on. Sparks flew everywhere, they each did not give an inch of ground as they slammed into one another with their full might. Dusk began to fire psionic abilities, first imbuing his galvanic blade with electricity so that it made Quel's body spasm whenever he fended it off with his sword. Then he unleashed a psychic scream that momentarily knocked Quel senseless. Going for the kill, Dusk overextended himself. Quel regained the use of his body in just enough time to sway backwards, making his lower back and leg muscles cry out in protest. He riposted with his left hand off of the tree, aiming a vicious slash at Dusk's neck, which bounced off of the psiforged's psionic shell, doing nothing.

Could nothing hurt this psiforged, let alone stop him?

* * *

Chuldo awoke to the good warm, scratchy feeling of having his beard back. He stretched and got painfully to his feet, his body ached all over like he had suffered from a hangover, but his thoughts were clear. Scanning the scenery around him, he was amazed to find himself on a ginormous tree.

"Blow me down an' call me Betty!" he exclaimed. Surveying the area he found he was completely alone. First thing's first, he had to find his daughter. It was then he noticed a large speck floating in the distance. Willing himself up into the air to investigate it took some courage, but Chuldo, King of Destruction, was full of courage (and bluster)! When he got closer he discovered it was the cannon they had all been trying to destroy back in the Coliseum. A man of fragile stature floated out from behind the cannon. It was the foul necromancer dressed in his black robes.

"It's time to settle the scores once an' fer all, eh wee man?" Chuldo asked with a laugh, cracking his knuckles and preparing to kick some ass.

The necromancer did nothing, his robes billowing in the slight breeze. But, in answer to Chuldo's rhetorical question, pale blueish-black energy coalesced around the necromancer and a giant ogre-like form appeared. It reeked of decay and rot. It spread its wings and shrieked, showering little driblets of rot all over the vicinity. Chuldo was disgusted beyond all reasoning by it and almost succumbed to its aura of decay and corruption. He did not know what it was, but his situation was perilous. He stood against an Angel of Decay, a being of ferocious power and might. A literal avatar of corruption and rot. Another being was summoned by the necromancer, this one being twice the size of the Angel of Decay. When it coalesced it turned out to be a giant zombie wyvern, its barbed tail still dripping a ghastly poison. The necromancer floated away, leaving Chuldo to deal with his two pets.

"Oy!" Chuldo yelled at his back. "Don't run away you coward!"

The undead horrors attacked, making him lose track of the necromancer and have to focus on the fight at hand. He was hard pressed from the beginning. He managed to knock the avatar of rot flying away, end over end. The undead wyvern stabbed at him with its tail and he managed to cleave the appendage in two with his spiked gauntlets before he smashed its head in with one punch of his mighty fists. It was all too easy a victory. The avatar of decay attacked him from behind, trying to choke him to death. Chuldo activated one of his armor's special abilities, making spikes spring up all over his armor and piercing the undead avatar multiple times. His armor shredded it severely and when the spikes retracted it fell away, out of the fight. Chuldo exulted in his easy victory and looked for the necromancer/summoner himself. When he saw him, far away and above him, it was already too late to stop him.

* * *

Saida recovered her faculties to discover she was lying on her stomach, aching all over from head to foot. She grumbled as she forced herself into a sitting position. Like everyone else she was on top of a tree as big as a moon. She had no idea where she was, but her keen cat-like ears picked up the kinetic sounds of battle. Snapping her head around, jarring a kink in her neck, and peering intently downwards, she saw Quel and Dusk fighting. Rubbing her sore neck, Saida prepared to dive down and join them when she was accosted by the summoner from Huzuz. He floated down to stand imperiously in midair, his arms crossed nonchalantly.

"I won't go easy on you this time just because you're a babe," he sneered.

"Likewise, I won't go easy on you just because you're a twit."

She cupped her hands together and pointed them at her foe in one fluid motion. A powerful condensed shock wave shot out of her hands and hit him straight on. He remained unfazed.

"You missed," he remarked offhandedly, then shouted out a name: "Apocalypse Hydra!"

The air around him in every direction seemed to explode. Saida leaped away, discovering she could fly in the process. When the cloud of smoke cleared it revealed a giant hydra, eyeless and black like a leech-except for its many saber-fanged mouths with blood red gums. All seven mouths shrieked deafeningly, making Saida hold her ears and hunch over in pain. She was momentarily stunned. The hydra oriented on her and all of the heads lunged at her with the intent to rip her into little pieces. Saida was still recovering from the deafening roar and was defenseless. Death bore down on her.

A flicker of movement distracted the heads as they closed in, but they ignored it. The idea of a fresh kill was too large in their minds. Fire leaped up out of nowhere and scorched them as they tried to kill Saida. They recoiled in agonized shock, screaming in pain.

Montrose glared at the new arrival: Abir, his head, shoulders and arms still wreathed in fire. He didn't bother with banter and immediately created a nova of light in front of himself, blinding Montrose. All seven heads now lunged after Abir. But the genasi had used his voidsoul ability to cease to exist. Seven heads hit only air and as the nova died down Saida aimed vicious shock waves at the heads, knocking them about and into each other with many sickening crunching noises. Abir reappeared and turned into a giant sandstorm that swept over the Apocalypse Hydra and Montrose, choking them and blinding them. Saida leaped into the middle of the storm and aimed a concentrated kick at the hydra's scaly chest, knocking it's breath out of it slightly and making it reflexively bend over forwards. Her strength was unreal to do that to something ten times her petite size.

Abir coalesced back into his genasi form, breathing heavily from his exertion. Montrose spat out mouthfuls of sand and glared at them both.

"Arcbound Fiend!" Montrose screamed in fury, raising his left hand over his head. It glowed a pale azure light before another summoned creature began to appear over Montrose's head. A robotic creature the size of a small elephant appeared. It was bronze in hue with blue energy leaking out of it from multiple places. It was cylindrical in shape, with the sides of the cylinder being its left and right sides. The oval front had a protrusion that looked almost like a skull. Many tentacles hung below it. Each tentacle was composed of many separate rings of metal that the blue energy leaking from the artifact ran through and bound together, like an electrical current, only more viscous and tangible. A pitch black cloud of smoke hung around its back, obscuring the majority of its hindquarters. A palpable aura of fear emanated from this thing, causing both Saida and Abir to hesitate.

Montrose laughed, shouting another name: "Sha of Wrath, I summon you!"

Yet another form took shape next to Montrose, this one somehow more disturbing than the other two combined. When it fully emerged into the world the very substance of life around it changed on a fundamental level. It was a Sha, a manifestation of the evil energies that flow through the earth. It was immense, standing over twenty feet tall, smoky in substance, looking like an insectoid of some sort, except for its very humanoid head that had seven eyes, its torso was like that of an insect, with a hunched back and seemed to vanish where the insubstantial bones of its lower ribs ended. Its body reappeared again where it had four crab-like legs.

Saida knew they were in deep trouble the moment it locked eyes with her.

"After all these years waiting for your call, you summon me to fight these squirming insects?" Laughed the Sha.

"It is enough that I summoned you. Remember our contract and relieve me of these two and their allies," Montrose replied evenly.

The Sha regarded Montrose silently for one moment. "The Sha do not forget," was all it bothered saying before turning to regard Saida and Abir with renewed intensity.

"I feel for you ugly," Saida said, cracking her knuckles in anticipation. "If I looked even half as bad as you do I'd be grumpy too."

* * *

She had awoken to weightlessness. Drifting through the air without gravity pulling her down. It had been peaceful, up until she bumped her head, hard.

"Ow!" Flau said, rubbing her noggin. She looked up to see a wall of wood, which she realized was a tree, which in turn she realized was huge. The sounds of loud shrieking attracted her attention. Flau turned and saw a giant seven headed hydra in the distance followed by a blast of flames as the hydra had lunged at something, or someone. Flau cast about for something familiar to head towards and saw Quel fighting Dusk a ways away, on the other side of her in the opposite direction of the hydra. That was still heading towards trouble and Flau was convinced she didn't quite have what it took for a fight of that level, not yet anyway.

A small shape caught her attention then. It was the necromancer heading towards Quel. Now that was a target she could deal with. Flau willed herself after the master of the undead and drew her dagger out of its sheath.

* * *

Quel was hard pressed to stand against Dusk, let alone even harm him. How he was supposed to defeat him was another matter altogether. The feeling of cold and warmth crept into his chest again and a few seconds later it erupted out of him in a wave of radiance that smashed Dusk down into the tree like he was a rag doll. Quel was too amazed to take advantage of Dusk's momentarily prone figure, but the psiforged recovered quickly, leaping to his feet before he could be overtaken.

"It appears you have help," Dusk remarked, a note of exertion entering his voice.

Quel didn't respond. "_Soar_, Kaze no Koe!" he cried to his blade. It blazed with its own power and transformed into its shikai form. Another burst of energy was warming and chilling Quel's body, coursing through him on its way out to destroy Dusk, battering down his psionic shields until it exposed him to a killing blow.

The burst of energy reached critical mass and...dissipated. Quel was at a loss over what had happened, until he noticed the shambling mummy men that seemed to be wrapped in spider webbing with glowing green eyes, transparent and ghostly to behold.

* * *

Endis neared the battle between Quel and Dusk and witnessed the exchange they shared after Quel smashed Dusk into the World Tree. Endis understood the subtle nature of their fight, the one-sided battle it was quickly becoming now that the boy had the help of the gods. Endis summoned forth six undead of a special subtype. These were known as Quell and it was in their nature to act as dampening devices to all divine magics, meaning the boy's divine assistance would be all for naught. The irony of their name did not escape Endis as he watched them subvert the boy's guardians.

A minute later the fight continued, with Dusk hitting the boy with a fully powered shock wave, sending him flying. Endis' work was done. The blustering braggart had finished with the wyvern zombie and the angel of decay, so Endis had to deal with him next. If he was powerful enough to defeat two such creatures with apparent ease he could present a problem.

Endis chanted to himself, reciting an incantation he hadn't thought he would need to use. Moments later a colossal shape appeared out of the cracks in between time and space. The giant beast unfurled its wings and stretched its long neck and tail, coming fully awake.

It was a Lethus dragon. Dreadful beyond compare, scales darker than the blackest chromatic black dragon and wreathed in a mantle of choking smoke. No dragon is more evil and dastardly than a Lethus dragon. They thrive on death and carnage and are known to live in such legendary and dire places as the cursed waters of the rivers Lethe, Styx and Phlegethon. This dragon was a paradigm of its kind. It was over one hundred and fifty feet long from the tip of its snout to the tip of its tail.

It cast about with its eyes, taking in the entire scene in one glance. Without taking any commands from Endis it attacked, using its unique breath weapon to unleash a psionic ultrablast that functioned just like a psychic shriek and passed through everything, even solid matter. Chuldo was reduced to a stunned lump and effortlessly knocked away by a flick of the dragon's tail.

Chuldo was knocked back into himself by the tail swipe, returning to full awareness. Angrily giving a battle cry, he flipped upright in mid air and aimed a Chulgab Attack at the dragon and watched as his numerous energy spears either bounced harmlessly off of its hide or pierced the very first layers of its armor plated skin. The dragon's head whipped around and Chuldo was caught off guard as it tried to swallow him whole. A titanic struggle ensued as he held open its upper and lower jaws with his arms and feet, literally propping them open. Endis turned to engage better prey, confidant that his summoned Lethus dragon would devour the upstart warrior sooner or later.

* * *

Rishi had recovered before everyone else and had been exploring the lower area of the World Tree when he heard a loud commotion echo throughout this zone of the Astral Plane far above him. He was in the lower reaches of the Tree, so his view was not blocked by any greenery. He saw the Apocalypse Hydra come into being, followed by the Arcbound Fiend and the Sha of Wrath. Only the last of the three summons made him stir. Calling upon all of his reservoirs of speed and endurance, Rishi willed himself towards the fight. They would be needing him desperately, he knew.

On his way there he encountered the cyborg of the Thief's crew fiddling with some machinery in mid air next to the World Tree and promptly hit him over the head, knocking him unconscious. Rishi didn't bother to look closely at what the Rogue Mastermaker had been tinkering with. If he had he might have stopped to destroy the small half finished machine, but he didn't.

Rishi shot across the sky like a rocket, arriving on the battlefield before anyone even knew he was there. He impacted with the hydra's backside like a cannonball and made it cry out in surprise more than pain as he made it roll forwards from the force of his impact alone. Saida and Abir concentrated their attacks on the hydra then, but were both each attacked by the Arcbound Fiend and the Sha of Wrath, respectively. Saida got entangled by two tentacles and smashed repeatedly into the tree, and quickly began losing consciousness. The Sha of Wrath took on the form of a hailstorm of smoky blades and slashed Abir repeatedly. He cried out and unleashed another nova of sunlight, fending off the Sha and making it retreat. Rishi appeared over the backside of the hydra, its seven heads hungrily seeking for him. He looked calmly at it, waiting for it to make it's move. Rishi's ruddy skin seemed to glow with an inner light as the hydra loomed over him. One jaw raced ahead of the others, intent on gobbling him down first. It arrived moments before its brethren and met Rishi head on and coming to such a grinding halt it was like it had tried to eat a mountain. Rishi effortlessly held up his diminutive hand, holding back the hydra's single head with his single hand. Then he moved his shoulder muscles a tiny bit and got the head to twist sideways. This was in preparation for his suckerpunch to its jaw, breaking the jawbone in one loud crack and sending the head flying back to smash into its fellows. Hydra teeth spiraled through the air everywhere.

Abir and Montrose looked at Rishi in stunned silence, the red glow around Rishi becoming even brighter than it was before.

Looking over his shoulder at them, Rishi smiled. "It's impolite to stare."

The Sha of Wrath oriented on Rishi. "You look like a challenge old man. I need a challenge."

"Don't bite off more than you can chew sha," Rishi replied waving his hand dismissively in its direction.

The hydra recovered and began to counter attack. Saida had somehow managed to grab the World Tree with her clawed hands and was currently in a very awkward tug-of-war with the Arcbound Fiend as it tried to wrench her free.

"Go help the lady out son!" Rishi called to Abir. "It isn't good karma to let a woman like that get beat up. Plus Quelly will get real upset if she dies."

Abir transformed himself into a roiling wave of lava that if he wasn't able to move about by thought alone would have turned him into an invincible, yet impotent opponent in this gravity-less place. As it was he flowed towards the construct grappling with Saida agonizingly slow.

The Sha of Wrath fired three Penetrating Bolts that all missed Rishi. He was skyrocketing towards it and making hand signs, casting some sort of spell. The Sha, amazingly, gave ground, not wanting Rishi to come near it. It threw down three Globes of Resentment that exploded like hand grenades, creating bubbles of foul looking blood-red clouds of shadow energy. Rishi dodged all attacks and finished his hand signs.

_"Storm Release: Laser Circus!"_ Rishi shouted. A blue halo of energy surrounded his hands, combining with his already red aura to give him a purplish glow. The halo expanded and energy beams spread out like a net, speeding towards the Sha of Wrath and exploding with pinpoint accuracy on its ugly face. The whole spectacle was blinding.

Abir finally arrived at the Arcbound Fiend and flowed over its upper body, making it let go of Saida and focus on him. He sizzled and scorched its metal frame and slowly began to eat away at it with his molten intensity. Gasping from her struggle and muscles aching all over, Saida watched the fireworks as Abir in magma form slowly ate the construct.

* * *

Up and down didn't really exist in this realm, so it was all from your perspective. It was like being in space with oxygen. Sound traveled especially far in this plane, which was a good and bad thing.

Flau was pleased and surprised with herself for being able to sneak up on the necromancer. She was only about six feet away from him now and had come at him from literally underneath, twisting and turning repeatedly to make sure she stayed behind him as he moved. She cocked her arm and prepared to stab him in the back. Something must have alerted him though, because he spun around, lightning quick, and reached for her. She screamed, kicking at him. He aimed a punch at her head that she barely dodged, his knuckles grazing her forehead and dizzying her. She lunged at him with the dagger and he tried to evade her, both of them being partially successful. The dagger gouged a hole in his chest, but failed to mortally wound him.

The necromancer counter attacked by chanting in an unknown language to Flau and pointing his gnarled finger at her. A second later a dark beam of energy shot out and hit her square in the chest. She thought her heart had stopped, gasping like a fish out of water with everything going dim. Blood flowed freely from a wound she could not see or feel, weightless in this gravity-less world, it began to enshroud her. As conscious receded she saw the necromancer turn away from her and began casting a spell in Quel's direction.

_No._ She told herself. _I will not die like this._ By willpower alone she forced her body to move, grabbing her dagger in hands suddenly gone numb and cold. She used the weightlessness to spin herself and throw her dagger with the last of her might, aiming for the retreating back of the necromancer. She didn't know if she even hit him or not. Forced beyond what her body could accept, she blacked out.

* * *

Chuldo wasn't doing so well. His muscles were beginning to cramp from the Lethus dragon's powerful jaw strength. He couldn't even change position to try and attack it. Sweat drenched his frame as the dragon chuckled, assured of its impending victory. Chuldo knew his strength was about to give way, he had only a few minutes left. It was then that Chuldo heard a sound to make him truly give up all hope: the Lethus dragon was readying its breath weapon again and with him stuck in its mouth he was going to get hit with it at point blank range.

"M-me...D-Dong Dong," he lamented, near tears. "Where are ye lass?"

"Right here you blockhead!" shouted Dong Dong from above him.

"Dong Dong!? Me darling girl! Where are ye?!"

The sound of a cordak blaster discharging was the only reply. Mere moments later the Lethus dragon staggered as it was hit by three high powered shells from the cordak blaster.

"I leave you alone fer ten minutes an' you end up like this?" Dong Dong berated Chuldo as he came flying out of the thrashing Lethus dragon's mouth. He spun end over end until he finally stopped, twenty yards away.

Dizzy from the whole affair, Chuldo looked up to see his daughter was much closer to the dragon then he was. It was looking at her angrily too.

"Run lass!" Chuldo roared as he raced towards her.

"There ain't no running in mid air stupid!" she shot back, uselessly pulling on the trigger of the emptied cordak blaster. She didn't have any more ammo.

The dragon slowly approached her, outwardly calm. Dong Dong could see the rage in its eyes. Then she saw something else that froze her blood: a horrible monster manifested in front of her. It was beyond description, and inspired her deepest instinctive fears to rage and take control.

She screamed in sheer terror and despair.

_"DONG DONG!"_ Chuldo shouted, almost close enough to save her. He saw a vague shape approaching her. If he tried for a long distance attack from this angle he could potentially harm her as well. So on he raced, pouring all of his energy into speed.

The horror grasped at Dong Dong, touching her shoulders and trying to pull her towards it. Part of her, her rational mind, knew it wasn't a real creature but an illusion cast to harm her. She understood that it wasn't real, but she was having a hard time telling her primal mind to believe that. A titanic struggle took place within her mind as it grabbed her. With a supreme effort she managed to believe what was in front of her wasn't real and break away from it. In doing so she saved her own life, but suffered severe damage from the illusion spell. Enough to knock her unconscious and cover her small body in numerous ghastly wounds.

Her father caught her as she swooned and, holding her to his chest, gazed with utter hate at the Lethus dragon. It recognized his power now that it could see the depths of his determination.

"Show me the power of your resolve," it intoned in a deep, sonorous and dark voice.

"I'll have yer guts for garters!" yelled Chuldo, tears streaming down his cheeks.

* * *

Things could be better, but they couldn't be much worse either. Every time he tried to call on his newfound divine powers they failed to manifest, the seven quell completely cutting him off from any divine assistance. Dusk was employing a deadly tactic, where he would excite the energy in the World Tree within a certain diameter. Many craters now riddled this section of the Tree because of his rampant use of psionics. Yet somehow Quel was still alive, against all odds. He could tell his time was running out. Every blow he traded with Dusk made him feel weaker and weaker. It was harder for him to lift his blade, fatigue was beginning to tell. But it didn't make any sense, because Quel had fought for even hours longer than this without slowing down. Why was he becoming so weak?

"You are doing well to last this long," Dusk said casually. "_Strength of My Enemy_ usually withers most men long before now. Your vigor is enough to almost remind me of the strength of my youth." Dusk was openly gloating.

Quel was both annoyed and irate over his current situation. "You haven't talked this much since we met. Feeling pretty Carthas?"

All traces of humor, though they hadn't appeared on his stark metallic face, left Dusk's body language and eyes. "Death is too easy for you."

Dusk raised his galvanic steel blade, pointing it directly at Quel. A giant wave of psionic energy erupted from the tip and overtook Quel like a mouse is overtaken by a tidal wave. Not for the first time, nor even close to the last, in his life Quel found himself overwhelmed and lost amid the tide of powers far stronger than his own.

Time was running out.


	25. 24 Wings of the Lighthawk

**Chapter Twenty Four: Wings of the Lighthawk**

**The Astral Plane, Somewhere on the World Tree, February 22nd 1392 a.c.**

Saida and Abir stood over the wreckage of the Arcbound Fiend, it had been reduced to so much slag. Rishi had knocked unconscious most of the hydra's heads and was currently punching it in its torso as he dodged the Sha of Wrath's attacks. Things were going very smoothly, almost too smoothly. That was when Saida noticed how bad Quel was faring.

"We need to help him!" she said, pointing to where he was farther up the tree.

"You're not going anywhere." Montrose said from right behind them.

Saida and Abir jumped. She was quick enough to snap out one fist for a solid blow to the summoner's head as she leaped away. Abir was also quick enough to send out a burst of flame as he pivoted around. Both attacks passed through Montrose like he was a ghost.

Saida knew an illusion when she saw one. Unfortunately for Montrose she had more than just acute sight. Going completely still and letting Abir protect her, Saida reached out to find the summoner before it was too late and he called in more reinforcements.

Rishi landed a double fisted blow to the hydra that made it waver, then dissipate into nothingness. The Sha of Wrath exploded into rage, firing off multiple shock waves that Rishi had to use all of his dexterity just to dodge, let alone counterattack. Abir, meanwhile, was firing off bursts of flame in every direction, trying his best to find the summoner by chance. They had everything well in hand for the moment.

* * *

Endis Mevlan could feel the cold steel of the dagger quickly growing warm from his own body heat and the warmth of his lifeblood. The girl had managed to deal him a costly blow, one he was certain was mortal. His death was upon him. As a master of necromancy, Endis found this very intriguing. He had strength enough for one last big spell and then he would pass away. He had to choose carefully and wisely how to spend his life's remainder. He spotted Montrose and his opponents and an idea dawned on him. Endis had a very surprising and nasty present to leave for his enemies.

* * *

Chuldo was in a bad situation. Not only was he holding Dong Dong with one arm, but he was doing it as he fought the Lethus dragon. He had to dodge while all the while landing punches to the thing's head and snout. Its jaws kept barely missing him. Thing's didn't look too good for him or his daughter at that moment.

* * *

Quel was out of time, it was now or never. Raising his arms straight up over his head, he cried out _"BANKAI!"_

A large explosion of energy rippled off of him and cascaded outwards, making Dusk take an involuntary step backwards. When the smoke cleared it revealed Quel in a wolf pelt cloak. It fell down his back in a very furry cape that had a clasp in the shape of a rodent skull hanging over his collarbone. He had matching furry pants that fluffed out like small pantaloons. The fur on all of his garments was a blazing white.

To top it all off he was wearing a Visored mask in a shape similar to a wolf's skull with a stylish design engraved on it in black. His eyes were a deep, almost blackish, blue underneath the mask due to his hollowfication; they were the eyes of a true predator. His zanpakuto had also vanished and had a powerful high velocity aura of wind all about it so that it looked like Quel was literally holding a large blade of pure air.

"You will not be able to hold that form for long in your current state." Dusk remarked casually. He was nonetheless worried: Quel was about ten times stronger now.

Without a single warning sign, Quel used a sonido to teleport behind Dusk and slash at him with his bankai. The psiforged remembered how fast Quel had been when his inner hollow had tried to take control before on Dalamud. From then to now was incomparable: he was twice as fast. Dusk was knocked flying to crash into the World Tree.

Climbing slowly back onto his feet, Dusk could tell his psionic shields wouldn't last for much longer under this kind of pressure. He had two choices: use a dangerous psionic ability, or use his trump card. He decided on the psionics.

He concentrated mightily on Quel and forced his dominance over him, trying to claim sovereignty over Quel's mind. He would try to put Quel into a reality that was all in his head, so that his physical body would die of dehydration and starvation. This was known as a _Microcosm_ and was a truly nasty psionic ability of high power.

Dusk was caught completely by surprise when his psionic attack not only failed, but was nearly rebounded onto him. Quel raised his invisible blade and slashed it down in Dusk's direction.

_"Bakudai hasaki!"_ shouted Quel as a giant crescent of energy sped from his invisible sword and expanded to block out the sky in front of Dusk. It cut through everything with chilling ease. The Moon Thief was out of options, death was bearing down on him on invisible wings.

* * *

Montrose was growing nervous. His most powerful summons were being effortlessly combated by that little old man! It was hard for him to believe that old man had defeated his Apocalypse Hydra, with his bare hands! And by himself at that! Cursing to himself, Montrose prepared another summon and watched as they struggled to defeat his Sha of Wrath. It wouldn't be easy to defeat him, if they even could.

A giant wall of wind sped over them, rustling their clothes and disturbing the battlefield. Montrose looked over and saw Dusk was having a hard time fighting a transformed Quel. Nothing he could do about it now. Montrose focused all of his energy into a summon that would be so powerful it would overwhelm all of his enemies in one attack. As he concentrated the old man was doing more hand signs, rapidly moving from one sign to another. The Sha of Wrath grew very wary, it sensed peril. It tossed so many Balls of Resentment at him that they looked like a mini avalanche. He dodged them all and finished his jutsu regardless. He was on top of the sha, it had nowhere to go.

_"Four Symbols Seal!"_ he shouted, grabbing the insubstantial Sha of Wrath by the head. A rock was summoned into being next to the old guy, appearing in a puff of smoke. The sha screamed as it was sucked into the rock and sealed within it, the mark of the Four Symbols Seal appearing on the surface of the rock.

"We've beaten you!" the genasi said triumphantly.

The cat-girl stalked closer towards Montrose, suspicious over his silence. Her eyes widened when she saw the almost invisible shell of energy that surrounded him as he tried to summon something to eclipse all of his previous summons.

"Get him!" she shouted in desperation.

All three of them sped across the intervening gap. They would be on him within seconds. Their response time was amazing and well coordinated, but they would still be too late.

"Hellions!" he cried, summoning forth two dozen giant serpents the size of small trains.

The three stopped and huddled together, unwilling to be the first to attack.

Montrose laughed at them. _"I Summon Thee! **Thromok the Insatiable**!"_

A giant explosion of sound and light blocked out everything. The three companions heard the horrible sounds of dying hellions amid the cacophony, but couldn't see what was happening until it was almost over. A giant hellion, ten times the size of all of the other hellions, had appeared and devoured its brethren whole. This hellion was of incomparable might and looked to be about one-tenth the size of the World Tree! It roared after devouring the last of its smaller kin, the very foundations of the Astral Plane seeming to reverberate from the force of its cry. The three companions desperately tried to block the sound of it out of their ears.

Montrose laughed, full of exhilaration and exhausted beyond his ability to cope. He fainted, becoming another bit of flotsam and jetsam in this gravity-less plane.

* * *

Endis finished the last word in his long winded incantation and placed the ancient evil artifact he had carried since he was a boy in front of him. The Eddos Ring. It looked like a regular hoop connected with a circular stand, but in actuality it was a doorway to the infernal plane of Durao. To anyone who knew of Durao, this spelled disaster. Numerous demons gathered on the other side of the portal, cautious, yet eager to see where it led and the destruction they could met out on the other side. Endis passed away just as the first clawed appendages began to pass through the portal.

Tanar'ri, the dominant and strongest subtype of demon, flowed out of the portal in large numbers. The first were the glabrezus, huge demons as large as giants, with two sets of arms, the top and largest ending in giant crab-like pincers while the other lower and smaller pair were roughly human in shape and size. A dog-like head, crowned with horns and a mouth filled with sharp teeth glared out at the world. These hulking demons stood at least fifteen feet tall. Behind these monsters came another type of tanar'ri: hezrous, giant demons that bear a small resemblance to toad-ogres. They were covered in knobby lumps and warts that were festering with a foul puss. They could walk on all fours or two feet. They stood at least eight feet tall. Behind them came more demons, including the sinister babau who looked like gaunt humans with black leathery skin, pointy ears and a curved horn sticking out of the back of their heads. They were covered in a slime that would harm anything that touched it like acid.

Many more types of demons poured out of the Eddos Ring, quickly forming a small army, which was being commanded by a trio of mariliths. Mariliths appear to be human women with six arms from the waist up, each wielding a different weapon, but from the waist down they had long serpent bodies. Wearing only jewelry, and no clothes thank you very much, they could be quite attractive looking. They stood about eight to nine feet tall and were about twenty feet long from the top of their heads to the tips of their tails. They were given the impossible task of commanding the unruly and disorderly hordes of the Abyss. They still managed to do it somehow.

Forming together this horde of terror and evil aimed themselves at the one target big enough to give them a good warm-up: the giant hellion Saida, Abir and Rishi were trying to find a way to kill.

* * *

The explosion from his zanpakuto's attack blinded Quel momentarily. He didn't have much time left in his Visored form. The longest he could maintain this form had been forty minutes, but that had been back when his body wasn't sealed and he was at his full power, capable of far more than he was now. His mask could shatter at any moment, he had to end this immediately. Quel turned to annihilate the quell's interfering with his divine aid and stopped cold, pivoting back to the dissipating cloud of smoke.

"Hahahahaha!" laughed Dusk from within the quickly fading smoke. His voice was changed, more metallic and deeper somehow. The laughing made Quel jump in surprise. Dusk should be dead from that blast, or at least in pieces.

Then the smoke cleared and revealed what lay within. What Quel saw made his blood run cold.

"How is this possible?" he breathed in surprise.

Dusk stood looking at him, his form had shifted and grown odd. He had a small tree growing out of his back for starters, its roots coursing through his body, the roots reinforcing the wooden and metal parts all over his body, especially his chest, shoulders, arms and stomach. Dusk's forehead had a glowing symbol on it now: two lines running down the center of his forehead towards where his nose would've been. What caught Quel's eye more than anything were the two "wings of energy" that extended from mid air in front of Dusk's chest out to the sides. Like the pinions of some bird in shape. If not for the ethereal beauty of their light they would be considered sinister. Thanks to his years at the Academy on Kotimaa, Quel had learned what these wings of energy were and how dangerous they could be. But they were also only thought to be a myth and not actually real. They were from legendary sacred trees that were imbued with energy from the theoretical 4th Dimension, which being a higher plane of existence gave these sacred trees power on par with the gods.

"How did you get an Ouritsuju implanted in you Carthas?" Quel asked calmly.

"Hahahaha! You have no idea what you've gotten yourself in the middle of boy!" Dusk mocked. "Powers beyond your understanding have shaped me into what I am. Even if you have stopped me now I can still rebuild! Your death will not be painless orpo! As it should be!"

Dusk extended his hands, the two wings flowing through him and transforming his charcoal black metallic body and dark orange eyes into a light blue chrome body with deep ocean blue eyes. He manifested a blue energy sword that coalesced into solid form, gripping it in two hands. Dusk had cast away his two swords on the wind, leaving them to drift aimlessly.

Quel raised his zanpakuto and prepared for death, certain that he couldn't win against the power of the Wings.

"You aren't here to quiver in fear Quel," Koe said.

Turning to look to his right Quel saw his zanpakuto's spirit standing right next to him. He knew only he could see him. Koe stood roughly seven feet tall and was about fifteen feet from the tip of his snow white snout to the tippy tip of his long furry tail. His blue eyes gazed into Quel's matching twin orbs and comforted him.

"Thank you for standing by my side partner," Quel said.

"Heh. I always will Quel. I'm you, remember?" Koe teased.

_"FULL POWER KOE! NO HOLDING BACK!"_ Quel knew they had only one shot at winning still. They had to focus all of their remaining power into one vicious death blow. Dusk had just become as powerful as a god, with the power of a higher plane of existence at his command. One Wing was enough to destroy a planet. With two Quel feared that it was all too easy for Dusk to complete his plans, even if all of the might of the Circle stood arrayed against him.

There they stood, before the final plunge. Two titanic powers about to collide with the sole intention of destroying the other. They each had their reasons, their path in life that they had followed to this point. It was no accident that they would reunite after centuries on opposite sides of the eternal war between positive and negative. This moment had been coming since the first day they had met, back when Quel had only been a frightened and powerless child. Back when Carthas had been in a body of flesh and blood, with a family of his own and his fall from grace had not been as complete as it was now. They each had a mystery surrounding them both. For Quel it was his past and the role he played as the Willbearer. For Carthas it was his reasons in kidnapping so many gods and goddesses and his true goal in doing so.

Now, at the closing moments of their shared tragedy, they looked into each others eyes and saw something of themselves. It was nothing even close to affinity, but something beyond their simple capacity to dismiss and ignore. In those final moments before they crossed blades for the last time, each of them understood the other a little better than they had before. But not enough.

_"**Mugen Taitan!**"_ cried Quel. His sword glowed with a maelstrom of dark evening sky blue, violet purple and sunset red, golden yellow and blazing orange energy. It flowed out of his invincible sword like water from a well, or blood from a wound. It looked like ambrosia, or the paint gods had used to color the universe; the last rays of the sun's brilliance before the night covered the world. It was one of Quel's strongest attacks he only rarely used when there was no alternative, a desperate last resort. It would cut the very fabric of existence if it had to.

"Fine boy, I'll beat your move," Dusk said. Raising his hands he began to sing a hymn, bass and deep, calling upon all of his vast energy. He began to vibrate and glow with the power of the Wings surging through him. "Behold a technique of my own design! _**El Dorado's Pyre!**_"

A giant sparkling cloud of dust detached from the tree on his back and coated his sword, making it glow with the light of a thousand suns. The dust covered him and surrounded his body like a cloud. The cloud becoming darker than gold, more of a coppery color in hue. It was a technique beyond rational understanding, capable of unfathomable levels of destruction. Quel didn't even stand a chance against it. And yet, knowing this, he still stood to fight to the last breath. It was his way.

Finally it was coming to an end, their blood was up. Screaming to the heavens, these two champions of justice and strife would collide and alter everything that would follow. His reitsu forming a skull like shell around him, Quel shot at Dusk like a falcon diving at it's prey. Dusk, like the almighty being he had become, ponderously and effortlessly rocketed towards Quel, his cloud of dust twinkling radiantly.

They met in a crackling storm of energy that shattered the sound barrier and created an explosion powerful enough to cause static electricity to be birthed and course through the tumult of sound and light like hounds on the hunt. It was an explosion felt across the entire Astral Plane and it was the beginning notes of the death knell of one of the two warriors.

* * *

Saida fired off two more shock waves at the colossal hellion, using them to send her flying out of the way of its giant maw that crashed once again into the World Tree, tearing out yet another giant chunk of the eldritch and godlike tree.

Rishi was hammering away with all his might, his clawed hands and feet allowing him to grip its scaly hide as he pummeled it's head. His overpowered punches did almost nothing to it. Maybe because he was the size of a flea on its back...

Abir tried hurting it with his magma, sand and fire forms, but was unable to land any serious blows. Just small patches of its thick hide's outermost layers had been peeled away. Saida suspected the only way to truly kill it would be to enter its body and attack its vital organs directly. The only problem with her plan was the fact that it looked like a forge inside its mouth, there was so much light and heat. It seemed to have some kind of internal fire that did not harm it, meaning any fire attacks would also be useless.

Sylvan beings, like treants, forest elementals and dryads, appeared and began combating the wyrm. Beings from the Celestial Planes that connected to the World Tree began to appear in large numbers and also tried to combat the wyrm. Couatls swarmed the wyrm and Celestial Archons, of every type assaulted the beast in phalanxes unlike anything Saida, Abir or Rishi had ever seen. Angels of all sizes appeared, often in the company of battalions of metallic dragons. Golds, Silvers, and all other hues of metallic dragons blazed in the light of the plane. The sound of it all was deafening. Saida, Abir and Rishi gathered together and stayed out of the way as this battle got increasingly beyond their ability to deal with. The wyrm was beginning to suffer from its many aggressors. And then things got worse, much worse.

Tanar'ri appeared in a great host and attacked from the rear of the battle. They attacked anything and anyone, sometimes even their own fellows, in the heat of the melee. Everything had gone from bad, to worse, to very bad, to shit crazy. Saida knew they had to get out of there or be killed by accident in the crossfire of this epically dangerous battle. Thromok the Insatiable was tearing into both sides, devouring everything in his path and shaking the heavens with his movements. But even as he did so both sides couldn't help but focus on him. His uncountable wounds began to tell. His "food" was slowly killing him even as they empowered him. It was just going to take quite awhile. Whether or not he ate them all before they killed him was another matter.

"We've got to get out of here!" Saida screamed over the cacophony. "Let's find everyone and go! Fast!"

"I'll go on ahead!" Rishi hollered back. "I can move faster on my own!"

They took off in two separate groups. Abir and Saida going fast, but comparatively slower than Rishi, who darted off like an arrow from a bow, into the thickest part of the fight.

* * *

The Lethus dragon was toying with the human warrior feebly clutching his dead daughter to his chest with one arm, while trying to fend off the supremacy that was a Lethus dragon with his other. Nepherixyen was it's name and torture was it's game. It played with its food, even after living for the countless centuries upon centuries that made it a Great Wyrm. It had tired of this game though, and suffered some new wounds that would turn into scars. The warrior had gouged it's hide deeply on the chest two times and had even sliced open it's snout quite deeply. But it was all for naught, death would be his only reward for surviving this long.

The dragon used the powerful spell Shadow Asgard, assaulting Chuldo and his already foregone daughter with negative energy that sucked the life force out of them. Screaming in rage, pain and fear, Chuldo tossed his daughter out of the affected area. It was all in vain, she was already dead. The Lethus dragon laughed mirthlessly over his stupidity. Now he would die. Enough life force had been siphoned off that three greater shadows had been created. They wouldn't be easy to see in a dim environ, but in this illuminated plane they were starkly black against the lighter tones of the realm. They appeared all around the man and began to attack him in a hit and run strategy, slashing at his armor and body and pummeling him into a defensive ball.

Now it would be finished. Nepherixyen prepared to leap in and tear the remaining life from the man's fatigued body. That was when something violently impacted with the side of his head, making all of the Great Wyrm's mass twist around so violently that it forced the rest of it to twist around as well. Dizzy and unsure of what had just happened, the Lethus dragon peered all about it, trying to find the source of the attack. It goggled at the tiny old man assisting the wounded warrior back to a ready position. All three greater shadows were gone, somehow defeated. The dragon was too old not to doubt what it's gut told it, so it targeted the old man, who seemingly harmless bowed towards it. The Lethus dragon almost missed the rapid hand signs the old one did as he bowed.

It recoiled in time for the full effect of the jutsu to hit it in the face. Lightning chakra flowing around his hands, Rishi fired off three Lightning Beasts that raced towards the Lethus dragon, umbilical cords of energy connecting them to Rishi's hands. They exploded against the dragon, damaging it badly on its head and neck. When it recovered from the shock and pain it found all three of the small humans fleeing at top speed. Roaring, it gave chase.

* * *

Saida was worried that they couldn't find Flau or Quel. Numerous times she and Abir had fought off curious, and thus murderous, demons. Logically thinking about their situation made her feel faint. Not only did they not have a way back to the alien world of Bionicle where the _Yahosun_ lay waiting to take them away to safety, but if they did manage to get all the way back to their ship through the city of then across the Silver Sea they would still need Quel to pilot them out of the invisible maze that surrounded the planet. Too many ifs.

"Over there!" Abir shouted over the tumult, grabbing Saida's shoulder and pointing. Looking where he indicated she saw Quel and Dusk staring at one another. Quel had changed, donning a white fur garb and a skull mask. Dusk had also changed color, turning blue. The very air around them seemed to teem with violence. Saida knew she couldn't go to him now. She had to find Flau first and then rendezvous with Rishi, Chuldo and Dong Dong.

Grabbing Abir, she turned and headed in a random direction, hoping against all odds to find Flau before she was killed.

* * *

Everything seemed to be created from pain. Pain was all there was and ever had been. It didn't feel like she was alive, or could know what that felt like. But finally, after being dramatic and feeling constant agony for who knew how long, Flau awoke to the world around her. She stared wide eyed at a three-sided war being waged between demons, angels and a giant wyrm. Flau had no idea how wounded she was, but suspected she looked awful. Forcing herself with supreme effort to move, she managed to float/crawl towards certain death: the portal through which the demons were surging. They hadn't yet seen her, which was surprising in this open environment.

Very far off, almost to the point of being a figment of her imagination, she heard her name being called. Blinking in delirium, Flau looked over and saw two very far away specks. One had flaming hair, so she suspected it was Abir. Who was Abir again? Oh yeah, the guy they had met imprisoned under Zakhara. Almost cute if you liked guys with glowing eyes and flaming hair who also had an attitude problem when not being mute. Flau belatedly realized she had forgotten what she was doing and with a sinking feeling of desperation tried to recall what she was trying to do. Then she heard the thrumming noise coming from the portal and remembered in a flash her whole bad day.

The portal was right above her. She had no idea how to stop it, but she had to try something. She had the strangest feeling this was all her fault. It was suicide to approach this portal, but she had to do it, battered as she was.

* * *

Saida called Flau's name over and over again as they raced through the fight, most of the times being attacked by demons and fighting them off before continuing. The fighting had gotten even more insane, if that was possible. Thromok the Insatiable was taking heavy damage as he lashed out at everything in sight. Demons and celestials were fighting brutally on all sides and in the background a colossal explosion of meeting energies created a shock wave that sent everyone flying, even tossing Thromok up a little bit. The battle petered down to silence, each side forming up for the final assault and rest for a second to lick their wounds.

The demons were currently tied in numbers with the celestials, but more and more reinforcements were pouring out of the portal. The sylvan defenders of the World Tree had suffered numerous casualties and were maintaining a solid defensive perimeter, only assaulting those who strayed too close. They didn't discriminate between celestial or demon, all were fair game. During this lull in the battle, Thromok the Insatiable finally breathed his last and melted back into a formless mass of energy that dissipated into nothingness. The shock wave created from Quel and Dusk's meeting had done him in finally.

Saida and Abir stood between both of the extra planar armies, with the demons in front of them and the celestials at their backs. So far they had received only goodwill from the positive beings, with them sometimes interceding and protecting the two of them during the battle when Saida and Abir had been running around.

Suddenly Saida's eyes locked on something near the portal. "There!" she said urgently, pointing.

Abir followed her finger and saw what she had seen: Flau feebly float/crawling towards the portal. The entire remaining host of demons stood between them and her.

"We have an army between her and us. I don't think we can save her." Abir said softly.

"You may believe that, but I refuse to give up just yet." Saida snapped. "I have yet to fully fight!"

"Well now might be a good time to." Abir chuckled, looking down on the arrayed demon host. "Let's give them our regards."

"Don't ye be fergettin' us!" came Chuldo's voice on the wind.

"I wouldn't dream of that Almighty King of Destruction," Abir said turning to look at Chuldo as he, Dong Dong and Rishi approached. "You look like you had your ass handed to you."

"What happened to Dong?" Saida asked, breaking in before Chuldo and Abir could begin to bicker.

"She suffered severe damage from a necrotic spell, but is on the road to recovery thanks to my healing," Rishi said. He was carrying Dong Dong. She was in a deep sleep and had many wounds all over her small form.

"Let's pay back these demons tenfold!" Chuldo roared, raising his fists and charging towards the demons. "FOR ME DONG DONG!"

Saida laughed wildly, charging after Chuldo. Abir sighed in mock disgust and followed her.

"Oh my, what people you have found Quelly Boy." Rishi mused as he followed at a more sedate and proper pace.

The tanar'ri watched them coming, too amazed to do anything but stare for some minutes. Then, like a hornets nest when disturbed, they poured out to meet the companions. It was very bad odds, easily 4 to 10,000. There was no way they'd last longer than a handful of minutes, at best. The celestial army did nothing but watch, still biding their time to strike.

"Let me lead!" Saida shouted to her companions as they neared the suicidal fight. Everyone backed off a hair, giving her the lead. Saida sped up, widening the distance between her allies and shortening it between her enemies and stopped abruptly, raising her hands over her head. Her muscles strained with the force of what she was doing. She gritted her teeth and growled as she harnessed a multitude of energy. Combining her hands together she placed them in front of her and, muscles straining, veins sticking up in her arms and neck, she aimed at the horde of fiends. Half a second later a colossal shock wave erupted from her hands and smote the entire demonic horde like a fly gets smote by a fly-swatter.

Saida swooned from her effort and Chuldo grabbed her and hoisted her over his left shoulder. They used her display of power to run through the ranks of demons. The front rank had actually been decimated, with every third demon in it killed by the wave. But farther within the ranks the damage was far less. Amazingly they managed to get almost all the way through the horde before it began to stir. Unfortunately the new arrivals at the portal were unaffected by the blast and they attacked our group with gusto.

Chuldo led the way, his strength and size was more than enough of a match for any glabrezu or hezrous. He bashed in skulls that day more than he had in many years. Somehow they were managing to survive in the midst of the denizens of the Lower Planes. Many a time they were stopped and had to break free after killing or wounding several or more demons. Abir provided cover with his flame blasts and sandstorms as well as nova balls of blinding light. Rishi fired off numerous Laser Circuses that dazzled the eyes and fried the skins of many a demon. Saida recovered halfway through this and, without getting off of Chuldo's shoulder, began to fire off rapid volleys of shock waves that sent any demon who got too close skyrocketing away.

But it was not all that easy. Demons conjured spells of all sorts to block their progress, ranging from walls of fire and acid to sonic screams that made their ears bleed. Flaming darts, poisonous astral bats, rays of fire and ice. Everything the demons had they flung at our heroes, which was slowing them and harming them profoundly, when it hit. Most of the spells missed and actually managed to do the infernal horde more harm than good. They didn't seem to notice they were hitting each other as much as, if not more than, their stinging little foes.

After what seemed like days they arrived at the portal. Weary and half dead from their numerous wounds and exhaustion, they still had to destroy the portal.

"Leave this to me," Rishi gasped as he handed Dong Dong to her father. "Keep those demons off of me while I concentrate. I only need about five minutes."

"Might as well be five hours," Abir remarked as the entire demon host began to sweep over them like a wave. What was worse was that many demons were still pouring out of the portal, right on top of Rishi. He, meanwhile, was busy sitting cross legged and meditating like some crotchety old hermit. With all this ruckus going on all around him he was still managing to find inner peace.

While Chuldo and Abir held off the first arriving demons, Saida darted under the portal, grabbed Flau's limp form and deposited her next to Dong Dong.

"Hi S-sai-d-da," Flau choked out through her pain. "How d-o I look?"

"Terrible," Saida said, teasing except for the look of sadness in her eyes. Flau was injured more than all of them. She was probably dying.

Things looked grim, then they got better and worse. The celestial army had come up on the tanar'ri from above and below in a pincer attack. Most of the demons had been focused on the small band of lunatics who had charged right into their midst and had not noticed the approaching armies from above and below. The battle up near the World Tree, and more importantly, the frenzy that had been it's trademark began again.

Now they could last five minutes, but what happened after those five minutes was anyone's guess. Saida, Chuldo and Abir stood near to each other and fended off any demon who came near in a concentrated assault. Dong Dong lay in deep slumber behind them near Rishi and the old sage was calling upon old avenues of thought and action to try and put a stop to the portal so the celestials would have a chance at stopping this fight before it leaked onto any other planes of existence.

The final stage of the long struggle was at hand. Everything was still undecided.


	26. 25 Answerability

**Chapter Twenty Five: Answerability**

**The Astral Plane, Somewhere on the World Tree, February 22nd 1392 a.c.**

When the dust settled and the sound waves diminished, it revealed both Dusk and Quel standing right in front of each other. Both of them were hunched over slightly from swinging their blades at one another.

"It looks like we've reached the end of our battle," rasped Quel, each and every word a a struggle to gasp out.

"Don't sound so pained, idiot," Dusk replied, his voice bearing a lot of strain in it as well, though not as much as Quel's.

They had each dealt the other a serious blow. Dusk, imbued with the power of a demigod had been more than a match for Quel at his most powerful. If Quel had sought to block Dusk's sword blow it would have resulted in him not only having his blade shatter in his hands but Dusk escaping any harm. He had instead taken the blow head on while aiming a powerful slash at the psiforged's torso. Both blows had done telling damage.

Quel coughed up blood and fell over onto his stomach, except that in the Astral Plane he just flopped forwards. A large gash ran from his left shoulder down towards his right hip and penetrated deeply into his body. He had nearly been cut in half, his own blood pooling in the air around him.

Dusk hadn't escaped harm, though. Quel had aimed every last ounce of his power into one point: the psiforged's chest. He had succeeded in stabbing Dusk all the way through, impaling him on his zanpakuto. Because Quel had aimed slightly upwards the small tree on Dusk's back had been pierced as well. Dusk's core and the tree's heart had both been penetrated. He was slowly dying. Again.

"You always were such a stubborn child," Dusk remarked, almost to himself.

"And you were always a strict teacher," Quel replied, just as softly.

They gazed at each other as the life drained out of both of them.

"Why didn't you kill me?" Quel asked. They both knew with the power of the Wings, Dusk could easily have cut Quel to pieces.

"I don't know," Dusk replied honestly. "Perhaps it is just your fate to live on Willbearer.

"I will not give you the Regalia. Even in death I cannot forgive myself or you for what has happened." Dusk summoned the device that held the many gods and goddesses in it. He grasped it and tossed it with all his remaining might towards the Eddos Ring and the portal to the Abyss.

"I'm sorry I chose you as a target for my hate boy," Carthas said. He was his old self again, without the persona of Dusk clouding his mind. "I have something I need to tell you before I pass on. Are you listening?"

"Speak on Carthas," Quel said, coughing up more blood.

They drifted together in silence for awhile and Quel thought the psiforged had expired, when Carthas started talking.

"I was reborn in darkness, not knowing anything of what I had done before I had died or even who I was. I had bursts of memory return to me in flashes. Vibrant memories tinged with sorrow I did not understand. Then _He_ came to me and told me who I was and what I could do to change my fate."

Quel felt a chill enter his bones. Either that or he was dying faster than he thought; one of the two. They floated there together in the stillness, the sounds of battle far off and distant enough to be in another world.

"He gave me a plan and the Regalia. I'm not even sure if he was real or a figment of my imagination. You asked me what my goal was in kidnapping all of these deities. It was the rebirth of Khyber, the dragon that forms the Underworld on Eberron. One of the Progenitors... His revival would have ushered in a new Dark Age..."

Quel was almost speechless. "Who made you do this?"

"I know nothing of him. Only that first meeting with him, which turned me down this path."

Carthas' eyes began to flicker, his time had come. "Don't die Quel. Live..."

One spark of light, as tiny as a mote of dust, detached from the slowly withering tree on Carthas' back and sped towards Quel. He watched it coming, curious and tired to the marrow of his being. It touched him on his Third Eye and the world vanished.

* * *

"How's that portal coming?!" yelled Saida over her shoulder, not taking the time to look as she dodged the claws of a glabrezu and kicked it in the jaw two times in rapid succession. The mighty demon recoiled backwards and was replaced by a succubus, blatantly naked with horns, a forked tail and bat wings. She was nonetheless pretty looking, until Saida broke her nose with one blow and sent her flying back to smash into the other demons and celestials struggling with each other all around them. Chuldo and Abir were holding their own, but all three were exhausted and would soon cave from the pressure. Dong Dong still lay in slumber behind Rishi. The little old man was still meditating and didn't respond to Saida's query. Flau had fallen unconscious as well and floated/laid near Dong Dong.

It had been over seven minutes since he had plopped himself down after asking for five to prepare something to stop up the portal. Finally, he stretched without making a sound and floated up to the portal. He went to the top of it, reached into his pack and dug around until he pulled out a shard of crystal that was honey colored. It impacted with the top of the ring and caused the majority of it to crack. Energy began to pour out of the ruined ring.

"Halfway done," Rishi said. "One good spell will finish the job."

"That's all you needed to do!?" Saida asked in outrage. "WHY THE HELL DID YOU HAVE US COVER YOU FOR OVER FIVE MINUTES!?"

"Because I needed the time to think and digest my edamame bean casserole I had for lunch earlier," he said with a shrug.

Saida hit him on the head very hard.

"Oh look at all de purdy burdies..." Rishi said to himself before falling over.

"You grab Dong Dong. You grab Flau and I'll carry our eccentric old man here," Saida said to Chuldo and Abir in turn, jabbing her finger at each of them. They all raced away from the portal, dodging and running now instead of fighting. It was lucky for them that all of the demons and celestials were too busy battling each other to pursue them. When they got far enough away, Saida fired off a shock wave back at the portal.

When it arrived the Eddos Ring cracked even more and gave way, exploding violently and knocking down demons and celestials for over one hundred feet in every direction. Our band was far enough away that instead of being knocked flat they were able to ride the shock wave.

"We have to find Quel and pronto!" Saida said. Without looking back they ran/floated on at the speed of thought.

* * *

He was standing in a clearing. Trees towered all around and from the odor of the air and the cloistered feeling this little vale gave off he suspected himself to be deep in the middle of an ancient forest. It was at the end of a beautiful sunset, night was falling. A single glimmer of light lay in the center of the clearing. The sky was darkening and the clouds that peeked over the horizon were shades of pinks, oranges and reds.

Quel was incorporeal, he knew that much. He was here to bear witness to something. This wasn't his first vision, nor was it going to be his last. He knew to pay very close attention to what it showed him.

A rustling noise was heard off to the side. He turned to look and froze. A man wearing a dark cloak with the hood up and over his head, hiding his features completely, was standing next to and looking down at the glimmer in the clearing.

Quel willed himself towards the man and tried his best to see who he was and what the glimmer was. He stared and stared in vain, unable to see the man's features. At least I can tell it's a he and not a she, Quel mused.

The glimmer revealed itself to be a small baby tree sapling. It was an Ouritsuju sapling.

_This is how the tree came to be in Carthas' back!_

Suddenly and violently, the hooded man turned and stared directly into Quel's eyes. His eyes were yellow, like a Sith's. Distorted by the darkness in his soul, they were windows onto the landscape within his heart and mind. Quel did not like what he saw.

The dream ended, everything fading away to a gray blackness. The last two things to disappear were the yellow eyes, still locked on Quel, and the glimmering little sapling. Sleepiness overtook Quel, making him drift off into a waking dream state. After everything that had happened to him in his life, from losing his parents to fighting this battle over the Regalia, he just wanted to lay down and rest. Let everything pass him by for now.

"Quel!" yelled a voice familiar to him, disturbing his rest.

He felt a spark of light pierce the gray blackness around him, forcing him to wake up.

"QUEL!" yelled Saida.

His eyes snapped open to see the cat-girl's face inches above his, a look of worry and relief flooded into her eyes. She didn't seem to mind the cloud of blood hovering around his body.

"My ears..." he said lamely, in the middle of a delirium. His mind wasn't firing it's synapses properly.

"Your wound won't stop bleeding," she said softly.

He peered down at the giant cut all down his front and saw that she was right: it was still bleeding profusely. He would be dead within minutes if the bleeding didn't stop and he still might die due to blood loss. Coldness of a very profound and deep nature was seeping into his body, trying to claim it.

A sudden inspiration occurred to him and when he saw that the many quells were gone he knew he had a chance to carry his wild idea through to fruition. He began a benediction to all of the goodly gods to aid him again in whatever capacity they could. He prayed for what felt like many minutes, with nothing happening and still more blood pouring out of him. His prayers were fueled by desperation and a need to carry on living. Then, with amazing suddenness, a divine light suffused his body and closed up his wound, filling him with renewed vitality and warmth. He stretched and yawned, almost overcome by exhaustion. He was very grateful to the gods for aiding him again, obviously.

Now he had to pay them back by rescuing the kidnapped gods and goddesses. He remembered that Carthas had thrown the Regalia into the portal. He had to go and retrieve the device from the clutches of whatever fiend held it and force his way back through the portal. Success wasn't likely, but neither was his willingness to simply give up.

Saida was not alone: Abir and Chuldo were behind her, carrying the limp forms of Dong Dong, Flau and Rishi.

"Are they...?" Quel asked, looking at Saida.

"No one's dead, yet." She clarified. "We need to get out of here quickly."

"I know where we can go," Quel said. He realized something had changed in him, but couldn't quite place exactly what it was. He knew it was important, but other things required his immediate attention.

They all set off for one of the many portals that opened up onto the World Tree. They were lower down on the trunk of the tree, not quite halfway up it's length. A shimmering portal stood before them guarded by a small squad of fierce angels in battle armor and wielding spears and shields.

"Hail and Well Met!" Quel hollered to the angels.

"Who goes there and what business do you have with Our Lord Oghma?!" yelled back the captain of the little squad.

"We seek sanctuary from this battle!" Saida answered back. "We aren't demons, if you can't already tell that much!"

"We have people in sore need of healing!" Abir yelled.

"Me daughter's life is in danger ye winged birdman!" Chuldo yelled. "Let us pass!"

"Please!" Quel added at the end.

The angels looked at each other and the captain looked everyone over once more, pausing when he saw Dong Dong and Flau. Flau looked horrible, covered in blood as she was and hanging lifelessly in Abir's arms.

"Alright!" The angel captain said loudly. "I'll let you pass, but only if you forfeit your weapons to us!"

"Ok!" Quel answered before anything could hinder this sudden acceptance.

Chuldo began to strip out of his armor, it being his one remaining weapon. Everyone else was basically weaponless, asides from them being living weapons, of course. Abir did his best to not look like an incendiary device given sentience and Saida tried to look like a harmless well-muscled woman who had no idea how to knock people out sixty different ways with just her pinky finger. Everyone floated towards the angels, but Quel hung back. Saida stopped to look at him, confusion in her eyes giving way to anxiety in a flash of understanding.

Everyone turned to look back at them both.

"You're not coming with us, are you?" she asked quietly. It wasn't really a question.

He shook his head, smiling at her lovingly.

"I closed the portal. The demons won't last much longer."

"But I have to find the Regalia before I can stop," he replied.

He was sad of eye and full of acceptance over his situation. Saida loved him very much at that moment. Without wasting any more time arguing, she glided up and kissed him. They stayed like that, savoring the eternal moment. They would not forget this. Saida detached herself and looked him in the eye. Her luminous orange irises matching his sky blue orbs in a shared gaze of longing, sadness and warmth. She could not stop him from going. To do so would be to break his character as a man and she couldn't do that to him. He had to do this. She also understood that if she went with him it would only hinder him from accessing his full potential.

Taking off his pistols he gave her his Life Belt along with his guns. She knew that was a very bad sign, but pretended she didn't know of the significance of his gift.

"Take these," he said to Saida. "They'll serve you well in a pinch."

"I will keep them close."

They stared at one another in silence for a second.

"Give 'em hell," she teased.

"With deepest regards from Saida," he added.

"I never told you my last name, did I?" she said, a nostalgic smile appearing on her face.

"I never asked for it," he replied with a matching smile of his own.

"It's Mi'ihen," she said, caressing his hair once before turning to glide back down to everyone else. "Saida Mi'ihen!"

"Go crack some skulls lad!" Chuldo yelled.

"Thanks for releasing me Quel!" Abir shouted. "You bastard!"

"See you again soon!" Rishi hollered, apparently recovered from Saida's blow. He had a large red bump on the top of his bald head.

Quel laughed. He would miss them all. He hoped this would only be a short trip where he got the Regalia and made his way back without a hitch, but he suspected differently. He knew differently.

* * *

The demons were putting up quite a fight. The World Tree hadn't ever seen such a catastrophe as big as this one. Quel found himself stumped on where would be the best place to go first. After hovering around the periphery for a while and coming to no sound conclusions, he sighed with exasperation and dove into the thick of it. His bankai form hadn't yet deteriorated his energies to the point where it vanished. He was quite surprised over that and wondered if his seal was giving way a little. His Visored mask had expended itself in his final fight with Carthas, so he couldn't call upon it to help him now.

He fought like a demon against demons, his invisible blade outlined by rushing winds lopping off appendages and heads with equal ferocity. His bankai's white fur clothing was beginning to get covered in blood and was by this point more brown and red colored than white. After doing this mindless and bloody task for a span of time, Quel saw a celestial commander trying to rally his troops and headed towards him.

"What's the situation!" Quel yelled at him, fending off two glabrezus intent on crushing him to pieces with their claws.

The celestial commander looked Quel up and down. Apparently satisfied he wasn't a demon (As if fighting two glabrezus wasn't a big indicator.) the commander talked with Quel.

"I don't recognize you warrior, but I will tell you this. A female warrior was sighted damaging the portal and then destroying it from a safe distance, but it somehow didn't work. The portal is still open! We can't get men close enough to go through and figure out how to destroy it!"

Quel lopped the head off one of the glabrezus with his sword and cut the other one in half when it gawked at it's companion.

"Leave that to me!" Quel shouted. "Get some of your best men together! Then follow me as I make a hole for you!"

"Understood!" the commander said, pausing. "Can I really trust you stranger?!"

"You're going to have to!" The commander didn't entirely like that answer but didn't argue the point either.

Quel had a pretty good idea why the portal was still open, but he had to make sure.

The commander got his squad together with astounding speed. Twenty-five angels and archons of justice followed Quel as he created a funnel of wind and shot down it towards where it ended at the flickering remains of the portal. Demons still streamed out of it, but their numbers weren't too overwhelming. Quel sent three scythes of wind at them that cut them to ribbons. He had forgotten how powerful his bankai was. His exhilaration was tempered by respect and caution: too much power inspired recklessness in those who didn't understand how to control it and honor it. That and they had to pass through a floating mess of body parts and other things less pleasant.

The squad, led by Quel and the commander, sped through the portal.

On the other side they encountered a small city's worth of demons, all of whom were shocked to see celestials brazenly attacking them in their own territory. Despite the initial surprise, the angels and archons would have been annihilated within moments if Quel hadn't been there. He conjured up five large tornadoes that caused panic; he summoned down three giant walls of wind that flattened the tanar'ri and carried them screaming off into the distance; and finally, he collapsed from overexertion when he was done. The Regalia was nowhere to be seen, but the cause of the portal's continued existence was found: a small crystal pendulum that spun back and forth on the opposite side of the gateway, maintaining a link to the other side.

_It must be a counterpart to the Eddos Ring. Some kind of Eddos Pendulum._ Quel groggily got back to his feet, two of the angels supporting him until he could stand on his own. At that exact moment they were unmolested by attacking tanar'ri, but more were martialing for another assault beyond the range of the five protective tornadoes.

"We only need one man to stay here and destroy the artifact. Everyone back through the gate!" the commander ordered his men.

"I'm not coming," Quel said.

The commander seemed surprised, but also grateful Quel was willing to sacrifice himself. He held his hand out for Quel to shake, opening his mouth to speak when a great conflagration of energy snuffed out all five of Quel's tornadoes and swept across the champions of good, knocking them all over. The pendulum shattered from the force of this energy and began to close rapidly.

"Go through the portal!" Quel yelled, shoving the celestials nearest him towards it. "I'll hold them off!"

An imposing figure appeared through the vanishing remnants of Quel's tornadoes. It was undoubtedly a demon lord. A hulking brute, over eighteen feet tall, even while hunched and covered in a pale-blue fur. Two leathery black wings extend from it's back, a long tail ended in a cruel point at it's rear and it's face was framed by raggedy large ears. It's eyes were tiny points of malevolent light above it's overly large mouth full of fangs.

Quel summoned up another gust of wind and used it to send all of the angels and archons flying through the portal. They all cried out, startled, but vanished through the quickly dwindling portal before their cries had even finished leaving their mouths. Now it was just Quel and the angry demon lord, along with a hundred or so of his minions... It laughed even as Quel readied himself for the fight. Quel smirked and fired off a giant scythe of wind that cut off one of it's wings. He would go all out from the starting gate, giving the demon lord no leeway.

Behind the falling archfiend he saw many more demons of all shapes and sizes coming to join the fight. It was going to be a long day. Then he noticed a small portal off to his right that seemed to be beckoning to him...

* * *

Saida stood in the middle of a great forest of verdant trees with a spring behind her. Flau and Dong Dong had just drunk from the spring and been healed. They were tending to their wounds and recovering from their ordeal on the World Tree. She felt empty. Quel had just thrown himself into the darkest and worst place anything or anyone could ever go to. He had literally gone into the depths of hell! She believed he would come back, but deep down she also knew there was no chance he would make it. He was probably already dead, torn limb from limb.

She was made of strong stuff, so tears would not come. It took a lot to make her cry, she was made of stern stuff and had been through many ordeals already in her life. Focusing on the present, Saida turned to talk to their guide: one of the many angels who dwelled on this plane, the House of Knowledge, domain of the god Oghma.

They would be staying here until they could return to the Prime Material Plane. But they had no idea how they would be going about doing that...

* * *

He was in a very bad predicament. The portal had led him to relative safety, but in doing so he had landed in a very sticky web and was currently surrounded by giant mutant spiders, their venom coated fangs dripping onto the webbing where the spittle sizzled and turned the web black. It wasn't the best way to go out. Struggling only further tangled him in the webbing and agitated the mutants. He chose not move and see why these blood curdling monstrosities weren't killing him.

He didn't have long to wait. A door opened in the opposite wall and an exotic female figure walked sexily into the room, hips swaying with every step. Her footfalls echoed loudly, no doubt because she wore high heels.

When she got close enough for him to see properly he was immediately aware of how stunningly gorgeous she was. Her beauty was enough to make any man crave her and be filled with desire. His eyes greedily tore over her body, admiring her ebon black skin and luminous white hair. She didn't have much clothing on, only thigh high leggings that had straps attached to a bikini bottom she wore. High heels and a crown resembling spider legs clawing at the sky was all she had on. Aside from that she had on minor accouterments of armor: arm bracers and knee pads shaped like spiders. Her pointy elf ears were pierced numerously with various earrings and many rings decorated her feminine hands. The rest of her body was exposed to the elements. Quel noted dully that her nipples were both pierced.

He was hers, entirely. She made his body grow hot with desire and lust. Anything she desired, he would have done. Even killing for her seemed only natural and part of life's greatness. Then he locked eyes with her and saw the depths of her evil black soul. First came fear, overriding her mind control magic, then came anger and rage over her despicable soul. He was mostly irate with himself for being weak and gullible enough to be sucked into her glamour like any common human male.

Then she spoke, and his mind shattered, reducing him to a mewling sack of meat. Her voice was power incarnate, making everything else vanish from his mind.

_**"I have been watching you for a long time. Do not worry for your quest is at an end: I hold the Regalia in my possession. I have much in store for you mortal. Do not struggle so, in the end you will cherish me, of that I am certain. And when the time has come, as the Queen of Spiders, it will be my supreme pleasure to introduce you to the ones who wiped out your little species of protectors. They are a perfect breed of my children, full of power and ambition. The Hämähäkit are dying to meet you."**_

In her eyes he saw boundless evil. She smiled and he knew she would toy with him, breaking him just for the pleasure of it, before she gave him over to his eternal enemies. The Hämähäkit had returned, all worlds would be fodder for their undying hunger.

Quel really couldn't see how his situation could get any worse.


End file.
